Wikipedia talk:Good article nominations/Archive 15

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New function for GA bot

I am reviewing Clint Eastwood for Talk:Clint Eastwood/GA1. I am wondering if GABot should be assigned the task of monitoring talk pages for GA review talk pages that are in excess of a certain size and changing the talk page inclusion to just say the review can be found at Talk:articlename/GA#.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 16:17, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Personally, there's no need to transclude the GAN review to the talk page. AfDs, PRs, ACRs, FACs, FAR(C)s aren't trancluded. The GAN template contains a link to the review, and that template is supposed to be at the top of the article's talk page. Once the review is completed, another bot converts the GA template into, or adds it to, the ArticleHistory template, preserving the link. If the review is too long for the talk page, just remove the transclusion yourself. Personally, I wish the bot would stop automatically transcluding the review to the talk page now, and be consistent with all of the other review/discussion processes that don't transclude. Imzadi 1979 → 19:27, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

I would disagree here because it makes the review more difficult to find, and adds an extra web page load to anyone trying to get to the review. --Rschen7754 20:56, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

The GAN page itself links to the review subpage,. The GAN template links to the review subpage just as the FAC template links to the FAC subpage, and both templates are in place at the top of the article talk page. That makes transcluding the review on the talk page unnecessary when no other review or discussion process subpages are similarly transcluded. To answer Tony's immediate question, if the GAN subpage is getting too lengthy, just remove its transclusion. Imzadi 1979 → 21:07, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

To repeat what has been said in previous discussions, this is a solution in search of a problem. No need to change the present practice. Jezhotwells (talk) 02:15, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Contrary to Jez, who seems to think manual labor of a task that a bot could do is preferable, I think we should automate things. The debate above is way off course focussing on whether the bot should transclude GAN talk pages on article talk pages. My point is that if the bot does that it should also hid text heavy GAN talk pages once they become too long. I don't understand why Jez seems to think everyone should run around doing tasks manually that a bot could do. Why would you prefer that we do what bots could do in our stead. I am not debating whether GAN talk pages should be on article talk pages, which is another issue. My point is since the current policy is to do so, the bot should also monitor when the pages get too long and hide them.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 05:03, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Aye ther's the rub. What would be the definition of "too long"? Alss, deleting a transclusion link that the bot puts there is hardly "manual labour", IMHO. Jezhotwells (talk) 14:26, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Too long is something that could be determined by consensus. The real problem is that so much review text is bulletpointed that we would have to use all content as opposed to readable prose. Something like 25KB is probably more than should be transcluded in whole on a talk page. I am just saying that people working on the review are not often conscious of their impact on the talk page via transclusion. The manual labor is people running around behind bots to do something a bot could do whether it be a single parameter in a line of code or a lot editing. I probably have a tendency to do some of the longer GA reviews (my two active reviews are for Clint Eastwood and Bobby Orr). I don't usually spend time looking at talk page, but I am familiar with a procedure at WP:PR where long reviews are truncated. What I am suggesting is that on talk pages, GA reviews be truncated beyond a length that could be determined. I am not necessarily averse to discontinuing including GA reviews on the talk page, but if we are going to keep them we should do something about truncating them.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 01:22, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Whether GA reviews should be transcluded onto the talk page is a matter of debate. The bot's role is to automate wherever possible the procedure that has been agreed upon. That being said, is there an existing rule that states that reviews should be un-transcluded once they get to a certain length? If not, we could debate having such a rule, and if such a rule is agreed upon, the bot handling it would follow naturally. harej 05:31, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Whether GA reviews should be transcluded onto the talk page is a matter of debate and a different one than the one at issue here. Please take such discussion to another thread.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 05:50, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Is there an existing rule agreed upon desired task that reviews should be un-transcluded once they get to a certain length? If not, we could debate having such a rule, and if such a rule is agreed upon, the bot handling it would follow naturally. This was the intended point of opening this thread. That is what I propose.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 05:50, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

The easiest answer: stop transcluding the reviews, period. Barring that, removing them once they hit a specified upper limit would be preferable. I'll let Tony toss out a size number, but once a review is long enough, the discussion from the review will overwhelm any other discussion on the talk page, and force the page into archiving (if it hasn't been archived already). The problem related to archiving, for me, is that the GAN review is already archived, like all review/discussion processes, through the {{ArticleHistory}}. I've seen article talk pages that wouldn't need the talk page archived just by removing the transclusion and letting the other templates "archive" the review. Imzadi 1979 → 10:10, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I am not averse to discontinuing transcluding entirely because I don't know why these discussions are given talk page preferential treatment over other discussions, but if we are going to continue transcluding we should have a limit. As I look at Talk:Clint Eastwood/GA1, I see the following numbers:

• File size: 101 kB
• Prose size (including all HTML code): 6848 B
• Wiki text: 47 kB
• Prose size (text only): 3208 B (561 words) "readable prose size"

Clearly a lot of readable prose is hidden in bulletpoint text. I would guess that just saying any review that reaches 25KB of wikitext is something that should be truncated like they do at WP:PR (probably for a number below 25kb).--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 01:29, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

The idea behind transcluding the review, presumably, is for visibility. It's easier to find, and there are greater odds that people watching the article will notice the review on a talk page rather than a subpage. If that is still the case, then I see no reason not to transclude an active GA review. WP:NOTPAPER. It won't kill people to scroll past a long review. Resolute 14:32, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

And if it does get to be freakishly long, then someone may at their discretion remove the transclusion if they deem it problematic. harej 22:41, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I think truncating like is done at WP:PR is preferable to removing. Then all reviews will have the same treatement.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 01:30, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Actually, a quick look at WP:PR suggests that they may no longer truncate, I am going to ping Ruhrfisch (talk · contribs) who runs PR.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 01:35, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Jezhotwells that this is a solution in need for a problem. There is nothing stopping users from un-transcluding the review page on a case-by-case basis. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 01:56, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

I for one find the transclusion quite useful, and I'd be quite surprised - well, more rightly confused - to find it hidden after an arbitrary point. Some people apparently like to, which is perfectly reasonable, but I'm not sure the GA system should explicitly insist on compliance with a particular style of talkpage management.

If the bot's currently causing problems by retranscluding manually-removed reviews, an easier solution might be to arrange the bot's workflow so it will only ever transclude the review once, when it's created. Shimgray | talk | 01:56, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

According to Ruhrfisch, PR has not required truncation since December 26. It is likely that anything that was very long then has closed and no current examples exist on WP:PR. According to User_talk:TonyTheTiger#PR_question, there is a adjustment that can be made to the discussion pages so that they only partially transclude.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 02:44, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Tony asked me to comment here. I will sometimes do partial transclusion of peer reviews to reduce the size of the WP:PR page. I only do it when the page gets too close to its upper limit (as then nothing would transclude correctly or display and PR would be broken). It is also important to note that it is still a partial translcusion, so the first part of the peer review still transcludes to WP:PR. Except for the bot leaving a notice on the Peer review talk page that the PR page is getting full, I do it all by hand, and only on an as needed basis. If the largest PRs are partially transcluded, anyone can still see the intro of each (the part the nominator writes at the start), but the rest is only visible by going to the PR page for that particular PR. It also saves a lot of space. There is a tool for checking what the largest PR pages are here. The bot has not said that PR is getting full lately - last time was Dec. 26.

The PR partial transclusion is done only when the PR page is full (it can have 70 or more PRs on it) to allow it to keep working. To me that is very different from what Tony proposes above. Geometry guy taught me the partial transclusion trick for PR and doubtless understands the details better than I. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 03:57, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

WRT Shimgray above, I understand that transclusion is useful. What I am saying is that there is general consensus that talk pages should not get too long, which is why so many talk pages are archived. The GA process can by itself with a single talk page section make a talk page longer than is conventionally desirable. I am attempting to fix this problem as a matter of routine bot-managed policy.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 04:09, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

If you ask me:) this is just something that is going to happen because it makes sense. Personally, it is just a matter of getting the right people to come to their senses. Maybe not this year, but two or three years tops.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 07:18, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

British Library Philatelic Collections

This article has been created as part of the British Library editathon (WP:GLAM/BL) with suggestions from the BL curator for the collections. I am unsure of where to classify this for review, it might fit somewhere in Social Sciences, could someone advise? I am hoping that GA review comments will help progress the article and we can ask for parallel expert comments from the curator, getting to a higher quality will also help the relationship with the BL for future collaboration events. Thanks, Fæ (talk) 11:48, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I would say "art and architecture", although "culture and society" could also be appropriate. Regarding the article, at minimum the lead needs to be longer, see WP:LEAD. Arsenikk ^(talk) 12:19, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I have been investigating the history section today, I'll re-visit the lead before nominating under, er, art. Thanks, Fæ (talk) 23:08, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Clarify my argument

Shakespeare authorship question

Previous peer review

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because it has been almost totally rewritten from a neutral POV using scholarly reliable sources only. In the past it has been a very contentious page and a POV battleground, and I want to try to take it to FA status, which I think would help stabilise it to keep its neutral POV.

Thanks, Tom Reedy (talk) 04:11, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Note: Because of its length, this peer review is not transcluded. It is still open and located at Wikipedia:Peer review/Shakespeare authorship question/archive2.

Rereading the debate above, there is much debate against untranscluding. I am not proposing untranscluding. I am proposing truncating like they do at WP:PR. Thus far, no one has stated opposition to this. What I am suggesting is taking an overly long discussion and truncating it down to its bare essentials in transcluded form. Here is a sample of the kind of diff that the bot could do for discussions that are too long, which is the way things are handled at WP:PR. The result is transcluded above. No one has stated any opinion on truncating overly long discussions so that in transcluded form as they are on talk pages they are short. Since there is general consensus that talk pages should not get too long, which is why so many talk pages are archived, and the GA process can by itself with a single talk page section make a talk page longer than is conventionally desirable, we should consider alleviating issue this as WP:PR does.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 09:11, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

As someone who sat on both sides of that particular PR (I acted as both reviewer and editor acting on other reviews) I'm inclined to agree with Tony. Granted that particular PR was exceptional in that it partly turned into a fringe-theory battleground—which made it yet more unproductive to transclude in full to the talk page—but even without that factor a long review (whether PR, GAC/GAR, or FAC/FAR) quickly becomes unwieldy and counter-productive on the talk page. It may be a mere personal preference, but I would generally prefer to have a review of any length a bit separate in order to use the article's talk page for any lengthy discussions of improvements, and the review page more for clarifications with the reviewer and reporting status of fixes. I also imagine that for GAC, specifically, a suitably chosen threshold for triggering limited transclusion would mean typical GA reviews—where the article essentially has one main editor involved, and the reviewer either has few/minor concerns or essentially quickfails it—would mean this change would not be actually noticed for a significant portion (perhaps even a majority) of reviews. I should probably also note that I speak here essentially as an editor: while I do occasionally review GACs, it's rare enough that I wouldn't care to venture too much of an opinion from that POV on this issue.

PS. WikiProject Shakespeare in general, and the Shakespeare authorship question article (fair warning: deals with fringe issues) specifically, desperately needs more editors. Anyone remotely interested in Shakespeare and an inclination to help out would be most welcome! This advertisement was brought to you by the society for the preservation of pop-culture, highways, and tropical storms; and the sub-committee for “…and, you know, that boring literature, history, and art stuff”. --Xover (talk) 09:57, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm a lot happier with truncation than with detransclusion - it's less confusing for the majority of people who don't already do it - but we still have the arbitrariness issue; defining a suitable threshold at which to truncate won't be easy, since what's "too long" will vary sharply dependent on what else is on the talkpage at the time (and on the personal preferences of the users involved). This sort of thing seems an excellent example of something that's better to leave to human judgement as and when people find it appropriate.

More generally, though, perhaps we could automatically truncate all GA reviews to simplify talkpages? Using the standard layout, reviews have the useful feature of having quick-reference "tickboxes" at the top and (usually) discussion below. If we wanted, we could put in default noinclude tags around the discussion section (with a link back as in the PR above), meaning that all you'd get on the talkpage would be a simple "yes to these things, still a problem on that one, see below for details" - talkpage readers easily see a synopsis of the state of play of the review, but the discussion doesn't expand indefinitely. Thoughts? Shimgray | talk | 13:55, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Generally truncating is a different discussion than truncating undesirably long discussions and it falls down the slippery slope of changing policy. That is not a discussion I am interested in here. What I am looking for is a comment on how to handle the longest GA reviews that cause article talk pages to become unweildy often without its participant's realizing. If people knowledgeable on the general tendencies of GA reviews could establish a guideline for the bot programmers on an objective measure of undesirable length.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:28, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Both de-transclusion and partial transclusion can be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. I still see no reason why the bot has to be involved with that at all. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 20:41, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Dog

Could someone delete the Dog review page, at Talk:Dog/GA2? An anonymous user seems to have created it by mistake, perhaps wanting to edit the article, which is semi-protected. --BelovedFreak 13:31, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Done. That's the problem with how's it's set up now, it reads like some random ip or new user is reviewing an article when they just leave a comment and never come back; no way to fix that unfortunately as far as i know. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:17, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Good article reviewer selection

Is it possible to request that a particular individual not review an article, when submitting it? (This is normal with journal submissions. For example if there is a conflict.) Would think that no one would expect submitters to run through a review with someone they have ongoing conflicts with or to allow reviewers to "grab" articles to hold them up.TCO (talk) 06:50, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

It's generally considered good manners to not review an article written/submitted by someone you have had a conflict with in the past. This is especially true if both editors have been working on the same article/in the same area. I don't think there are any formal rules about this, but it is rather an unwritten one to just stay away from each other. There are plenty of other reviewers out there. Dana boomer (talk) 13:27, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

It seems to me that there are not plenty of other reviewers out there, which is the source of the problem. May I suggest a process where if the nominator has problems with the reviewer as he starts the review, the nominator leave a message on the reviewer's talk page. The problem is that once a reviewer has spend several hours preparing a review, it is unfair to Wikipedia limited volunteer resources, to ask the volunteer to step aside. We won't be able to determine whether the request is personality based or based on a subject-matter dispute. In any event, if an impasse develops during the review, a second opinion can be requested. If the article was passed by another reviewer, the person with a conflict can still do a reassessment. The best solution is the recruit a large pool of reviewers. Racepacket (talk) 17:54, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

I would make my object known at the time of listing the article, so no work lost. No need for drama, but just a simple statement. I am used to this at real journals. The converse, where a hostile reviewer (already known to be) can actually troll the articles malovelently would make me not submit (if it became a problem, like it looks to becoming). Personally, I would never imagine review something myself if the writer had pre-emptively said he did not want my review.TCO (talk) 19:18, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

P.s. I think the answer on backlog is to go quid pro quo. After the first GAN, at least one review must be done before each new nom brought in. Someone who can get an article (successfuly) though GA knows a thing or two and can be a decent reviewer or can learn it. Probably not as good as some Wehwalt-Malleus type, but we don't have an unlimited supply of that anyhow. TCO (talk) 19:21, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree. It seems to be what DYK have done, and it looks to be working.--Korruski^Talk 13:38, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

(undent) I don't think it's just the nominator's problem to have to bring up that they've had a conflict with a certain reviewer in the past. If a person is going through the list looking for one to review and sees an article written mainly by a person that they have had a major conflict with in the past, they should skip it. Don't review it. That's really just common sense. There are many other articles on the list, and other people will eventually review it. There's no reason to jump into an area where you know there's a good chance of an argument starting when it's really quite easy to avoid it. Dana boomer (talk) 15:08, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Help - 1907 Tiflis article

The current GAN page says that this article is being reviewed, but it is not. The editor in question made one quick remark and hasn't edited wikipedia since. I tried to change the nominations page to let others know that this article is not being reviewed and a bot undid my edit. Can someone please help revise the entry so that people know it is not being reviewed and needs a reviewer. Thanks. Remember (talk) 14:11, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

I have deleted the review page after moving the commentary to the talk page. The next time the bot goes through it should remove the "under review" tag from the GAN page. Dana boomer (talk) 15:51, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Still need help

Whatever Dana boomer did, does not appear to have fixed the problem because it still appears as if the 1907 article is being reviewed when it isn't. Can someone let me know whether the bot is going to fix this or whether there is something else that needs to be done. Remember (talk) 19:37, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

This has been fixed. Thanks for all the help. Remember (talk) 21:29, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

GAN Drive

Is there going to be another GAN backlog drive anytime soon? I think it would be a great idea if someone organised another one of these, because were back in the same position... 3-4 month waits..RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 18:31, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

I seem to recall March/April being discussed but I can't find the thread. Jezhotwells (talk) 19:06, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Okay thanks for letting me know. If there is no more word on it, could we try and aim for March. I know everyones busy these days though. =)RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 00:39, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

I think they have done it in April the last few years, but it makes more sense to me to have one in October to coincide with the final round of the WP:CUP.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 20:07, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Looks like a rough consensus is forming for the next GA backlog elimination drive to be in March and then another one six months later in September. See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Good articles#April 2011 GAN backlog elimination drive for more details. Also, some other comments there would also be appreciated. –MuZemike 02:53, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Articles that are likely to change significantly in the near future

I'm doing a PR on Torchwood. the fourth season debuts in the summer of 2011 on Starz. I'm sure there's a guideline about articles that are likely to change significantly in the near future. Can anyone making this clear either way. --Philcha (talk) 13:06, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Is this what you're thinking of? Malleus Fatuorum 17:39, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

If the GAN were on something like Torchwood (season 4), then there's no way it would pass the stability criterion of GA. On the subject of another season impacting the article... it depends really on the subject in question. It might be better to wait for the next season before any GAN/FAC noms, but other than that WP:BREAKING doesn't have any bearing on the article in that it's entirely notable regardless. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 18:53, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

For GA purposes, six months from now is not "in the near future". The stability requirement is about edit warring and content disputes, not about the possibility of future expansion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:56, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

To be safe, within the tropical cyclone project we wait until after the season ends, and a post-storm report is issued for each tropical cyclone, before considering good article nominations. In the case of an article about an annual television series (if the article was only about season 4), waiting until after the season is over to send it through GAN/FAC makes sense. If this is the overall article on the subject, I'd think you could submit it at any time. Or would that be considered current class as long as the series was still be produced? Hmmmmm.... Thegreatdr (talk) 20:37, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

I think WP:BREAKING is that I was thinking of, thanks. --Philcha (talk) 20:31, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Consider that Barack Obama is an article that, for at least two more years, is always likely to need to be expanded. There's new information each day at the news, and each day it must be considered if the new information should be added here, added to a subarticle, or dismissed. And yet, that has not been a problem to promote the article to featured status (of course, the rule about article stability applies there as well) MBelgrano (talk) 02:07, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Question re second opinion

I'd like a second opinion for Talk:Olivia Shakespear/GA1 which is being reviewed by a first time reviewer. Does the reviewer have to request the second opinion, or can it by done by the nominee? Thanks. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 21:43, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

This plea is unacceptable. Truthkeeper88 is making improvement on the article difficult, specifically in the development of a neutral tone and cutting excessive detail that impedes the flow of the article. She suggested I fail it, which I should on the broad in coverage and neutral tone criteria. I understand "where she's coming from". She has spent considerable time and effort writing the article and does not appreciate the suggestion that a single word be cut from the article. She apparently has great faith in her abilities and appears to be hoping a reviewer will drop by who will agree with her and give her an easy time. 56tyvfg88yju (talk) 22:48, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

It's a perfectly reasonable request. Although the decision to either list or fail the review in this case will be yours, any other reviewer is perfectly at liberty to offer a second, third, fourth ... opinion. Malleus Fatuorum 03:16, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

56tyvfg88yju's comments in the GA nomination warrant another opinion and the bleaching of this review from the eyes of anyone who ever read it. --Moni3 (talk) 17:03, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Not to mention a close eye in future. His approach and conduct is not acceptable, at all. Ceoil 20:51, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Someone somewhere else observed that the kind of gross incivility demonstrated by 56tyvfg88yju (not just in this review but in at least one other that I've seen recently) is rarely dealt with effectively. Blocks for alleged profanity are much easier to apply, even though the impact of naughty words on one's own talk page is generally negligible. If anyone has the energy for it, and if this sort of thing continues, then the only recourse is to begin an RFC. That of itself won't solve anything of course, but it would be a stepping stone to an eventual solution. Malleus Fatuorum 21:11, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

RFC's are a waste of time, for everybody; pointless legalese, politicking and bickering, and more or less a howmany friends have you got contest. Better is to argue him directly whenever he acts like this again, and he will. Ceoil 21:33, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

I can't say that I disagree with your opinion on RFC, but it's a necessary precursor to ArbCom should this situation continue. Malleus Fatuorum 22:06, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Something like this is really should go to AN/I , particularly because it's spread across more than one review. Never thought I'd write something like that, but ... it's worth a thought. I'll think about about it and maybe file a report - or maybe not. The crux of the matter is that this is the kind of gross incivility editors should never have to endure. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 22:09, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Its not really for AN/I; thoes people know little enough about style or content to be of use. Ceoil 22:39, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm agreeing Ceoil; AN/I is where you go if you're trying to get someone blocked, it has no other purpose. Malleus Fatuorum 22:42, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Well its a very handy place to get noticed and pontificate if you have time on you hands and are so inclined. Ceoil 23:46, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

It's also a good place to hang out if you have aspirations of ever becoming an administrator, but yeah, essentially useless. Malleus Fatuorum 00:59, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

I agree, but what exactly the first step in the DR process? It's not an RfC, as far as I know. At any rate, I'm going to let this drop now, but watch to see what happens with other reviews. I'll re-list the page, but not until I've had a bit of time to look through it, which I won't have time to do until mid-week at the earliest. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 23:22, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Well, so far as GA is concerned, the only step is either to seek a review at GAR or to renominate at GAN. But they're article review processes; if you want to address the ongoing behaviour of a reviewer then there's really only RFC. Malleus Fatuorum 23:32, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

... although having said that, one administrator I upset did once threaten to ban me from reviewing at GAN, so I guess a topic ban might be a way forwards if the problem persists. Malleus Fatuorum 01:02, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Hey Malleus, Truth, Ceoil and the others... Just butting in to let you guys know that 56tyvfg88yju is actually an alternate account of disruptive user Piano non troppo (talk · contribs) who was kinda topic banned from FACs, came back swiftly through this alternate account and now doing the same thing. Both RFCs and ArbComs will be ineffective in this case, and I strongly suggest that a topic ban from GAN as well as FAC should be placed. — Legolas ^(talk2me) 16:32, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Wrongly failed GA's

I've had several wrongly failed GANs (in my opinion) in the past… Am I aloud to like repost it in GAN (at it's original place, like cutting in line) and asking for a second opinion? If not that should REALLY be allowed… Thanks, keep any comments cool,,,, CrowzRSA 01:37, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Which articles are you speaking of? Dana boomer (talk) 01:47, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

(ec) If you believe a review was wrongly failed, then you can open a community GAR. On some occasions, community GAR can provide a fresh review, but this is rare. However, GAR can also restore nominations to the GAN lists (and has done so in the past). Hence if you make clear that your preferred outcome is to reinstate the nomination at its original place, and reviewers concur that the GAN review was unreasonable, then there is a good chance you will get your nomination restored.

The point/benefit of this approach is that the next GAN reviewer may notice (or be pointed to) the GAR and see that the previous review was considered inadequate. Geometry guy 01:59, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Cristiano Ronaldo GA

I was randomly looking at some of the GA reviews when I noticed this, the Cristiano Ronaldo review page has essentially nothing on it. I originally chalked it up to a reviewer taking their time on the review but I noticed that it has been two weeks since the page was created. To make matters worse the the nominator has been blocked and the reviewer has made no edits of any kind to Wikipedia in the last 6 days. One of the edits they did perform was to change their signature on the GAN for Robin van Persie to an IP address. Should anything be done with this situation or am I making mountains out of mole hills? Thanks--Mo Rock...Monstrous (leech44) 20:57, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

In those cases when a reviewer leaves, another reviewer is more than welcome to take over and get the article reviewed. If the nom was blocked though, the best course of action would be a review and fail, since there's no one to fix the issues now. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:40, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

I saw the initial nomination and don't think the nominee has ever edited the article. Looked like a drive-by nom. Not sure if it's either best to fail or simply remove any nomination entirely. Brad78 (talk) 14:55, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

I also canned the Robin Van Persie nomination, but that was more due to the fact that there were severe reference issues–half were bare links and at least one was dead, in addition to several that were just flat out unreliable–than a lack of editing on the article. If anyone disagrees with what I did, I sincerely apologize and you can take appropriate action. SCS100 (talk) 20:32, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Kamadhenu/GA1 problem

Resolved

 – Removed the line from the GAN page. --Admrboltz (talk) 16:25, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

An anon has commented WP:OR on the Talk:Kamadhenu/GA1, creating the page. The bot has updated the GAN page making the anon the reviewer, which is not true. This will deny the article's chance to be in the backlog, if it languishes on the GAN page. How to fix this???? --Redtigerxyz ^Talk 15:40, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

I deleted the review page. --Admrboltz (talk) 16:01, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, but what about "Review: this article is being reviewed (additional comments are welcome). 212.183.140.42 (talk) 19:35, 27 January 2011 (UTC)" on the GAN page. Does that need to be removed manually???? --Redtigerxyz ^Talk 06:46, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Hrm, the bot should have taken care of it. If you don't mind grabbing it, or I will trash it in the morning. --Admrboltz (talk) 06:48, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Reviewing and offline sources

What should I do when an article is mostly or completely based on offline sources which I cannot access? Or when the sources are online but in a foreign language I do not speak? Should I be reviewing such articles at all? It's difficult the check the article's factual accuracy without having access to the sources, unless the reviewer has relatively deep personal expertise about the subject. But this I think is rarely the case (I, for once, don't have any real "expertise" about any of the nominated subjects). I'd like to help with clearing the review backlog but this problem is preventing me from reviewing most of the articles. What is your advice? Nanobear (talk) 23:34, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

If you choose to review such articles, then as a (potential) reviewer it has to be your decision. I have reviewed quite a few Norwegian transport articles with online sources in Norwegian and similarly a few Southern American transport articles with online Spanish/Portuguese-language sources. For both localities I can't read these sources in native-language and I've used Google to translate the sources into English which it does tolerably well, but some of the translated sentences are non-sense (and if necessary I've also used a dictionary). I'm therefore fairly comfortable in reviewing such transport nominations, since I am familiar with the general topic but not necessarily the locality. I've also reviewed a few, long as well as short, Jewish (Israeli) and Palestine architecture articles where some of the sources are in a script that I can't read let alone translate. I would not review these articles if all the sources were in a script that I could not read: having said that I did review one or two short architecture articles where all the sources where written in Cyrillic (I can't read or machine-translate this script). It basically come down to trust, or lack of trust. If the sources can't be "read", then you have to take on trust that the citation does verify what is claimed; that there is no plagiarism and/or copyright violations; and that it is an accurate use of the source material. It is also difficult to assess whether the scope of the article is broad enough to cover the local context (WP:OR being discouraged). It basically comes down to "comfort zone", I don't review nominations that take me outside my comfort zone (i.e. Cyrillic, Hebrew, etc, scripts in most topics). My comfort zone has, however, expanded as a result of such reviews - or perhaps my "recklessness" has increased. Pyrotec (talk) 15:17, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Offline sources are perfectly acceptable, provided that they meet WP:RS guidelines. There's these buildings called "libraries" which store these things made of paper called "books", which might help you. As far as non-English sources are concerned, the English Wikipedia does prefer English language sources, so those should be used preferably. Occasionally, it is necessary and/or appropriate to use a non-English source, so it depends on the article and the context in which it is being used. Google Translate may be of use here as well. WTF? (talk) 18:17, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

You can also ask for help from Wikipedia:WikiProject Resource Exchange, and the editors at the article may be able to supply you with direct quotations if the information is supported by a single short passage in a book. It's also worth looking for online sources, since the lack of a URL in the article isn't proof that none exists.

For translations, I've also found that asking for help at country- or language-specific WikiProjects is frequently effective. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:36, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Travel Bug/GA1

Same issue as the previous section. Miyagawa (talk) 20:26, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Fixed. I'm starting to get annoyed seeing ips and single-edit users doing this very frequently of late. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 20:30, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Oops

Resolved

I accidentally created the page Talk:Airbus A330/GA1 when I'm the one who has contributed to the article. On the page it says that the reviewer is myself. Can somebody please revert my action. Thanks Sp33dyphil ^{(T • C • I love Wikipedia!)} 22:46, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Done by User:Wizardman. Gary King (talk · scripts) 01:14, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Question on GAR

I've been away for more than a year, and I see that a bot has taken over the process of updating the GAN queue. How do I ensure it indicates the article I'm reviewing is on hold and uses my signature? JKBrooks85 (talk) 23:50, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Welcome back! The bot has picked up that it's on hold, as you've correctly changed the {{GA nominee}} template to show this; I think the bot can be a little myopic at detecting signatures on the review page, so I've copied yours higher up the page as well, and hopefully the bot will pick it up soon. If however someone could explain exactly what the bot needs to see to note who the reviewer is (and why the pre-loaded page with the reviewer's name automatically generated isn't enough), I'd like to know too. Bencherlite^Talk 00:02, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Well this worked! Bencherlite^Talk 00:05, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes that is the key thing, there shouldn't be anything written above the sig if the bot is to pick up the reviewer. Also if a reviewer just creates a page but adds no content for a while, the GA report bot shows it as amalformed review. Jezhotwells (talk) 11:50, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Bruno Mars/GA1

User:Silverskylines has been inactive for over a month. Would anyone mind if I took over the review? Adabow (talk · contribs) 05:44, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Go for it. I was going to but my activity will be patchy for a while. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 04:00, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Nominations by indefinitely blocked former editor

As my former supervisors would say, we have an "opportunity" here. Racepacket (talk · contribs) was indefinitely blocked earlier today for copyright violations, and he's since retired when his unblock request was denied. He has currently nominated the following here at GAN (nominations reviewed and on hold in italics):

1. Getty Villa
2. Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art
3. Band of the Hour
4. Cornell Plantations
5. Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science
6. Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Wisconsin
7. Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority
8. Red Line (Washington Metro)
9. Orange Line (Washington Metro)
10. Miami Project to Cure Paralysis

I guess I'm asking the community what we'd like to do with the nominations. Given the recent concerns raised about his editing, I think some caution to look for copyvios may be warranted. Imzadi 1979 → 17:17, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm reviewing Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority; it is on hold because of scope issues, and as of now is still far from reaching the necessary level for pass. Briefly looking at the other two Washington Metro articles, it seems unlikely they will pass of similar reasons (very short history section, in part lacking references) without a partial rework/expansion. Arsenikk ^(talk) 18:02, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

The two currently under review should be failed; as for the others, they can still get a review, and can just be failed after review unless there's almost no issues. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 16:22, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps instead of failing it, send the GA hold notice to the appropriate WikiProjects (like they were the editor) and use the normal 7-day hold period. --AdmrBoltz 04:55, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Do we have any confidence whatsoever we're not considering articles chock-full of copyvios? Courcelles 05:04, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I've failed Cornell Plantations, not for copyvio but for lack of third-party sourcing and excessive detail. I had already been looking at doing that review before knowing Racepacket was blocked/retired, but was wary of getting involved with him again (he didn't like my prior fail of Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science). Wasted Time R (talk) 15:23, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I've failed the three Washington Metro-related articles. All three had partial lack of sources, and had severe lacks to the history section. Another reviewer seems to have failed Getty Villa. Arsenikk ^(talk) 16:14, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Failed two myself; Miami Project for copyvio, Band of the Hour for having almost no info. Only Phillips Petroleum remains. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 16:21, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

It looks like that everything has received a review and been failed. The only review currently open is the RSMAS article, and that will probably be closed as a fail before long. Thanks folks for pitching in. I went to review the Phillips article, and it was already failed. Imzadi 1979 → 16:32, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I reviewed and failed Getty Villa & Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art as they were nowhere near ready for GA status, also there were copyvio concerns. Jezhotwells (talk) 22:03, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Section goes very sluggish

hello,

could someone review the articles in the section "Sports and recreation". It doesn't progress prudent like it should. Thank you.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 10:06, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm hitting a few where I can. You're always welcome to grab a couple to review as well. Luckily 35 is actually lower than the sports section usually is. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:12, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Dreaming of You (album)

Why did GAbot "failed" and removed this entry? AJona1992 (talk) 18:23, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

The bot doesn't like humans editing the WP:GAN page. As you can see from the "how to nominate an article" instructions, at the top of WP:GAN, you no longer need to edit the page directly. Just add the template to the article talkpage (which you have done) and the bot should pick it up in a few minutes. The article hasn't been actually "failed" though, just removed by the bot. As I say, it should add it back in a few minutes. --BelovedFreak 18:29, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

So I don't have to do anything, now? AJona1992 (talk) 18:31, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

No, you shouldn't have to. I've tweaked the talk page template too: "|status=" shouldn't be set to "onreview" until a review is in place; "|page=" should have been "1" not "2" as there is no previous review at /GA1. Bencherlite^Talk 18:33, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Alright and thank you for clarifying the confussion. AJona1992 (talk) 18:35, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

No problem. Hopefully the bot won't reinsert the duff information next time, now that the talk page template is ok. Bencherlite^Talk 18:39, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Review not shown

The review for John Endecott has not been listed by the bot on this page. Magic♪piano 16:33, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I think the problem is that the template on the talk page of the article hasn't been altered to say "|status=onreview" or "|status=2ndopinion" (which from a look at the review might actually be what the reviewer wants). Bencherlite^Talk 16:55, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I tweaked the status, though the bot can't tell who the reviewer is. Not sure how to fix that. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:11, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I've added the reviewer's signature towards the very top of the page; I don't think the bot picks it up if it's too low down, but I don't know how far down it looks before giving up. Bencherlite^Talk 17:19, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

The bot does not pick up the reviewer signature unless it is one spaced line below the bottom of the template, as far as I can tell. It also needs a time stamp. Hopefully my edit has rectified this. The instructions seem to be quite simple to me, I am surprised at how many reviews turn out to be "malformed". All that is needed is to click the follow this link in the template and then write the review underneath. Quite a few reviewers appear to use a different "cut and paste" approach. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:14, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Largely abandoned reviews by TeacherA

After a six-month absence from WP, TeacherA (talk · contribs) showed up four weeks ago and took on two reviews, Talk:Mitt Romney/GA1 and Talk:Christchurch, Dorset/GA1. The Christchurch one was never done, leading the nominator BarretBonden to ping TeacherA without response. The Romney one was done initially (in TeacherA's erratic and often cursory style; see his reviews in the past), and the nominator (me) and other editors quickly responded with comments and article changes as best we could, but TeacherA has been unresponsive since then, except for some brief comments a week ago that (as another editor pointed out) showed he hadn't actually looked at the changes that had been made to the article since the initial review. Nominators are expected to respond to GA reviews quickly (the 'hold' period is usually a week); shouldn't reviewers be held to the same?

Now, I and others have pointed out before on this page that TeacherA doesn't know what he's doing with GA reviews, and I've indicated my suspicions that TeacherA is actually a sock operation of some kind running a low-grade disruption game against the GA process. Regardless of whether that is true, is it possible to get a ban on TeacherA doing further reviews? And regardless of that, is it possible to get the two current and largely abandoned reviews reassigned to someone else? Thanks ... Wasted Time R (talk) 15:53, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Ykraps is the nominator of Christchurch but I was concerned about the inactivity of TeacherA and was also going to ask if there was anyone else willing to take over the review. Would it be acceptable to remove the on review status from the GA nominee template? Barret (talk) 13:04, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

You can, but unfortunately there's no way to get the bot to say it needs a new review; it'll still say TeacherA, but someone does need to go and review it, since he clearly won't. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 16:16, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Why not just change the page parameter from '1' to '2', and remove the "onreview" status? That way the bot recognises a new review. Or you could change the status to "2ndopinion". Adabow (talk · contribs) 04:08, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

I will take over the Christchurch review and use the note parameter. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:30, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Any volunteers for the Romney review?Anythingyouwant (talk) 00:16, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Personal attack

hello,

I reviewed the article Talk:2011 Australian Open/GA1 and all what I got are words like "thick" and "silly" even if I were friendly. I think I won't even start to review articles in GAN if I get such comments. Thank you.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 19:14, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

not my fault you can't write properly — Preceding unsigned comment added by KnowIG (talk • contribs)

I don't think the reactions by KnowIG are very helpful -- but I also respectfully suggest that Greatorangepumpkin does not appear to have good enough English skills to be doing GA reviews. This is not, after all, the Simple English version of Wikipedia. Looie496 (talk) 20:36, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree with GOP, the comments KnowIG has left on the GA page are not acceptable, even if GOP's English skills are not of a high standard. I have warned the KnowIG; GOP, I recommend you fail the article since KnowIG is not going to address them sensibly. wackywace 21:27, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, it appears that User:KnowIG has been blocked for one week due to incivility. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:20, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

And I've deleted Talk:Svetlana Kuznetsova/GA1 (article nominated by GOP, review page created by KnowIG with the text "and don't expect me to be nice.") using that well-known speedy deletion criteria WP:POINT. Bencherlite^Talk 00:28, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I responsed to the comments, but now in a nasty language.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 13:27, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Diff. Hardly sensible to carry on in the same aggressive manner, let alone boast about it here, particularly when KnowIG has been blocked for incivility – do you need to be warned as well? And continuing the review in that manner isn't going to help when KnowIG comes back after his block. I strongly suggest that you either drop this review and let someone else take over, to avoid future conflict between the two of you, or at the very least undo your last comments and reply in a more constructive manner. Bencherlite^Talk 14:09, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

OK, but it really bugs me if someone speak me with as if were a clown. I think I leave the prose to someone else whose english is better than mine.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 14:13, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

GOP has agreed to withdraw from the review, so I've collapsed the previous discussion and edited the "|note=" parameter to request a new reviewer, although it will be a while before KnowIG is able to attend to it. Bencherlite^Talk 14:29, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

News

Where do notable past news events go on the nominations list? I'd like to nominate Manila hostage crisis. It looks like GA standard to me but probably won't get through first time round, however I'd like an impartial editor to review the article with GA criteria as it currently stands. --Deryck C. 01:09, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

I strongly suggest that you start by saying on the article's talk page that you feel the article could be nominated for GA, and asking for input from editors who have contributed to it. Looie496 (talk) 01:42, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Conan_(TV_series)

I'd be ready to review Conan_(TV_series), but List of Conan episodes shows that the 1st series started on November 8, 2010 and as of today (8 Feb 2011) shows 46 of to 56 (February 24, 2011) the titles and, for the last few shows, the music / entertainment have not been identified. I'm concerned that it may be premature to go for a GA - in addition to the titles and music / entertainment, I feel it would be to wait until we see further critics comments, whether there's a 2nd series, etc. What to others think? --Philcha 14:20, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

Well, from what you have said, this might fail on lack of broadness, criterion #3. Suggest you discuss with the nominator. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:27, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Had we spotted this right when it was nommed, I would agree with the above. However, since it's taken so long for a review to happen, I think we can proceed as normal, agf'ing on the table being completed (I don't think any users would actually abandon an article just because it got the GA icon on it, at least i hope not) Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:28, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

neutrality check for "Gery Chico"

Hi! Would someone please do a neutrality check on Gery Chico? Currently the article has a cleanup banner that mentions "COI" and "news release" concerns, and WP:RGA says that cleanup banners may make an article more likely to be quick-failed. I've tried my best to comply with Wikipedia's WP:NPOV standards, but I feel that I cannot remove the banner because I have a conflict of interest myself (I'm involved in one of the mayoral campaigns, not necessarily Chico's). Thus, I would appreciate it very much if an unbiased contributor would take a brief look at the article to see if it doesn't meet the quick-fail criteria. Geread (talk) 06:15, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

I've taken a good look at this and decided to quick-fail it, for reasons explained at Talk:Gery Chico/GA1. Wasted Time R (talk) 03:52, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Misunderstanding

User Bzuk has put up his hand to review it this page. However, when I requested him to actually review after a few days of inactivity, he said, "I am not the reviewer, merely an editor getting the article ready for review" on my talk page. It looks like that he doesn't know the process of reviewing that well. Could someone please delete the page Talk:Airbus A330/GA1 so somebody else will review the page? Thanks Sp33dyphil ^{(T • C • I love Wikipedia!)} 09:24, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I've deleted the review page, as it seemed that the "reviewer" had no intension of reviewing the articl. Please tell me if I've messed something up. Arsenikk ^(talk) 11:28, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Today I created the review, and the bot updated with the original date and the original reviewer. As I am sure this isn't the last time such a misunderstanding is going to happen, is there any way to easily fix this. Of course, we have better things to do than spend hours on such an issue, but if there is a simple solution, it would be nice. Arsenikk ^(talk) 12:16, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. I believe that once an entry for a review has been created, the bot reads the reviewer data from the database it has created. I am not sure if it would really slow it down if something has changed, i.e. the sig of the reviewer? Jezhotwells (talk) 13:34, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Can user Arsenikk please put forward an ultimatum for the article? I've been waiting for a few days, but no comments have been posted. Thanks Sp33dyphil ^{(T • C • I love Wikipedia!)} 01:53, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

How to classify a medieval fair?

Under which subtopic would a medieval fair (Tewkesbury Medieval Festival) be listed? Although it features a re-enactment of a battle long-past, the fair is more than that by now (and more of a social celebration/enjoyment along a medieval theme). Jappalang (talk) 03:55, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

I suggest Culture and Society (under "Organizations, members and cultural events"). Geometry guy 08:11, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, I have added that to the subtopic at its talk page. Jappalang (talk) 01:37, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Please delete review for Joseph Smith, Jr

An editor initiated the review at Talk:Joseph Smith, Jr./GA2, but provided no actual review. As the FAQ on this page recommends for this case: it may be best to delete the review page: requests for such deletions can be posted at WT:GAN. So here I am, posting the request for deletion so this article can get a proper review. Thanks. ...comments? ~BFizz 03:05, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Never mind. I instead followed the FAQ's suggestion to increment the counter and set the status to blank. ...comments? ~BFizz 23:17, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Steph Cunningham

I'm reviewing Steph Cunningham, a soap character, at Talk:Steph Cunningham/GA1. I'd like other reviewers' opinions about section Steph Cunningham#Storyline. You may find WP:WikiProject Hollyoaks useful.

• I think this section is too long. --Philcha (talk) 13:42, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• How can one verify the storyline. E.g. what if 2 editors disagree about what happens, or which characters are involved, or the timing and sequence of events. --Philcha (talk) 13:42, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

The section is too long and can be cut down. However, When writing about fictional characters the storylines don't need sources per :MOS:TV#Plot section it states: "Plot summaries do not normally require citations; the television show itself is the source, as the accuracy of the plot description can be verified by watching the episode in question. An exception to this rule may be shows containing plot details that are unclear or open to interpretation, in which case the different interpretations should be sourced to reliable sources." (I do know there are FA's have been accpeted without this. Over two hundred GA's too.)RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 16:53, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Hi, RAIN*the*ONE. Re "the television show itself is the source, as the accuracy of the plot description can be verified by watching the episode in question":

• How can someone who didn't see the original broadcast check what happened? E.g is there a DVD set that includes all episodes in which Steph Cunningham appeared?
• Steph Cunningham appeared in the show for 10 years - so about 510 weeks, about 2,550 episodes and about 1,275 hours (a little less than 2,550 episodes, see "Hollyoaks takes the leap into five nights" - Chester Chronicle). If another editor disagreed about the events or their interpretation, how could the deadlock be resolved? It's unlikely that a 3rd editor, even if he / she had a DVD of all the episodes, would want to check all the relevant ones. That is one of the functions of independent sources. --Philcha (talk) 13:22, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Can someone else put an opinion in please? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Raintheone (talk • contribs) 22:53, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Might I suggest using the primary source for citations if no reliable sources have such summaries? That seems to me a good way to move forward. One can cite to the episode concerned with {{Cite episode}} (broadcasts) or {{Cite video}} (DVD). This fulfills WP:V and is inline with WP:PS, provided the summary is simply descriptive of the events with no interpretations or conjectures. Jappalang (talk) 11:59, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

At Talk:Steph_Cunningham/GA1 the nominator has asked for a 2nd opinion. --Philcha (talk) 11:52, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Bot strangeness?

• Why is Cirrus cloud nominated by Reaper Eternal (talk) 02:40, 13 February 2011 (UTC) listed at the top of the Meteorology and atmospheric sciences section?
• Why is the bot not picking up the reviewers for Relief of Genoa and Thomas Gage. Jezhotwells (talk) 14:52, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Also, why is the bot insist on moving Maniac Mansion from "Video games" to miscellaneous? I think the bot is seriously acting up. –MuZemike 16:24, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

I have fixed Maniac Mansion, it was signed with MuZemike rather than MuZemike (talk). It definitely can't read "non-standard" signatures. Jezhotwells (talk) 18:47, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't know about that; the last few GA nominations, they found their way in the right section, and I've had this same signature for a couple of years, now. –MuZemike 21:43, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

I am hazarding that "Part of a three-way collaboration effort between [[User:JimmyBlackwing|JimmyBlackwing]], [[User:Guyinblack25|Guyinblack25]], and [[User:MuZemike|MuZemike]]. Article is also rated "high-importance" at [[WP:VG|WikiProject Video games]] and "top-importance" at [[Wikipedia:WikiProject Adventure games|WikiProject Adventure games]]. –[[User talk:MuZemike|MuZemike]] 07:38, 15 February 2011 (UTC)" is simply too long for the note parameter (or mayhaps something about the markups messed up the bot) since once it is removed, the bot operated normally. Jappalang (talk) 08:55, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Cirrus cloud's date/time parameters in its {{GA nominee}} was messed up, manually. Jappalang (talk) 09:35, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

As for Relief of Genoa, it appears that User:hchc2009 replaced the {{subst:I am the reviewer|1=~~~~}} directly with '''Reviewer:''' hchc2009?[1] Otherwise the template would have substituted it with '''Reviewer:''' [[User:hchc2009|hchc2009]] ([[User talk:hchc2009|talk]]) timestamp. Perhaps that is why the bot put his unlinked name on GAN and marked ??? in the edit summaries.[2][3] Jappalang (talk) 09:48, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Similar case for Thomas Gage, the reviewer decided not to use the template;[4] hence messing up the bot's detection.[5] Jappalang (talk) 09:52, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Length of queue

I see that most articles have to wait 2.5 to 3 months. And I see it was as bad at the end of Dec 2010. Any ideas on how to remedy it? I've suggested before that any one who nominates an article must review one before nominating another - except that new nominaters get 2 reviews for free, so they learn how reviews work. --Philcha (talk) 13:57, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Well according to the latest Wikipedia:Good article nominations/Report, there are 351 nominations, of which 300 nominations are awaiting review, 14 are On Hold, 37 are under review, and 120 have been waiting for more than 30 days. Simple arithmetic shows that approximately two thirds of the nominations are less than a month old. Sports and Recreation and Theatre, film and drama typically have three month waiting lists; which suggests that these two topics are under-reviewed. This has always been the case, so it seems that nominators of such articles are unwilling to review them. I'm not convinced that giving two free reviews and then making people review one for each nomination is going to lead to good reviews: more of "you pass mine and I'll pass yours type reviews". Pyrotec (talk) 14:53, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, I personally find reviewing artciles on minor tv shows and "personalities" tedious and frequently get hassle from fan nominators who can't actually get their heads around the GA crieria, likewise with the vast number of nominations for professional wrestling, basketball, baseball, lacrosse and other USA sports. Just my point of view. Jezhotwells (talk) 14:58, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree about "... fan nominators ..." - in section "Film, TV and Theater" there are plenty, while I'm waiting for one on a serious film director to get its turn</rant> In 2009 some one advised me to review a few sections on article then wait - and if response a slow or these sections are still poor, fail the article.

OTOH I couldn't complain about USA sports, there are enough readers who enjoy them.

And why do some of the science sections have so long queues, e.g. "Biology and Medicine"? --Philcha (talk) 22:08, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Lack of reviewers. Pyrotec (talk) 22:28, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Presumably the "serious film director" is Robert Rossen, its only been in the queue a fortnight or so, I'll review it tomorrow. Your penance is .......Pyrotec (talk) 22:40, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Question about bot

I just initiated a review of Dog, at Talk:Dog/GA2. However, a review had accidentally been initiated already by somebody else, who blanked the page after realizing the error. I added the basic review-cruft to the existing blank page and started my review. My question is, will the bot pick this up, or do I have to do some hand-editing to get things to show up correctly? Looie496 (talk) 19:10, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

The bot will probably show the name of the original non-reviewer, but I have added a note, and changed the status to "onreview", this should be picked up by the bot within the next 30 minutes. (forgot to sign this!) Jezhotwells (talk) 01:51, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Not responding

User Arsenikk has not responded to Talk:Airbus A330/GA1 for a number of days. About 90% of his comments have been fulfilled, and more changes have been made. Those unfulfilled have been given reasons. I have posted many times on his talk page, but no responses have been made. Can somebody please deliver an ultimatum on this article; I'm confident it's going to be a pass. It's stable, neutral, well-written, broad in its coverage and factually accurate. Can somebody comment or pass it, please. Many thanks Sp33dyphil ^{(T • C • I love Wikipedia!)} 06:06, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Arsenikk responded on 10:05, 17 February on Talk:Airbus A330/GA1 (see [6]), that was yesterday. Pyrotec (talk) 10:33, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I would be better if you checked the review page instead of posting here. As stated in the review, and repeated yesterday, the article has many unreferenced claims, which is why it isn't being passed. Arsenikk ^(talk) 12:02, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Picture licensing question

National Ignition Facility fell off FA because of questions concerning the licensing of the images. It is not clear even now what the exact answer was, but it seems it just sort of fell off the list. So then what is the requirement for GA? The images could only ever be used under fair use, the lab has strict licensing requirements and won't consider CC-by-SA or similar (yes, I tried). Maury Markowitz (talk) 18:38, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

I don't see any indication that the article was ever a Featured Article. According to the history on its talk page, it didn't pass FAC in 2008, and so it was never listed as a Featured Article. Now, the license requirements are really the same for GA and FA: if it's not freely licensed, an image needs a valid fair-use rationale. That rationale means it sets out why the image is allowed under the WP:NFC. If it doesn't meet those criteria, then the image should not be in use on any article, regardless of assessment status. (Even a stub should not use a copyright-protected image without a valid rationale and use that meets the criteria.) Otherwise, an image needs to be licensed for use under one of our acceptable licenses like Creative Commons or be released into the public domain. Imzadi 1979 → 19:33, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

In agreement with the first reply, the basic image requirements apply to all articles: images must be either public domain, freely licensed, or fair use. Fair use is a compromise, however, as Wikipedia articles should, ideally, be entirely free – hence WP:NFC. GA and FA differ only in flexibility: images are not required for GA, and there may be more tolerance for fair use images at GA level. The GA criteria for images focus primarily on correct licensing and valid fair use rationales, as failures in these respects can be particularly harmful.

This article illustrates the issue very well, as all the images are described as public domain US government works, when they are not. The article would currently fail GA for that reason. To meet the GA criteria, each image should have its copyright status clarified (Credit: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory) and be provided with a fair use rationale. Geometry guy 20:40, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Renaming an article while undergoing GA process

In Sinyavin Offensive (1942), it seems a more Common name, Siniavino Offensive (1942), should have been used (see Talk:Sinyavin Offensive (1942)/GA1). Considering the GA process is sort of semi-automated by GAbot, our question is whether the article should be renamed now or after the GA review is concluded? Jappalang (talk) 00:27, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

I think you will have fewer problems to fix if you move the article after the review (ensuring that you move subpages, and update e.g. ArticleHistory links). Geometry guy 01:11, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

Agree with above; moving it in the middle of a review would probably screw things up, but moving after a review should be fine. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 04:12, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

Okay, thanks. Jappalang (talk) 08:50, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Oops... (messed up page somehow)

While reviewing Battle of Tabu-dong I forgot that we have a functional GA bot now and manually changed the WP:GAN page. It did some sort of maintenance, and so has not passed the article which I have. What needs to be done to fix it? NativeForeigner ^Talk/_Contribs 02:55, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

The bot is likely to over-write your changes to WP:GAN next time it runs, and it probably already has; but you will not win any "fight" against the bot. Try reverting the article's talkpage review template to something like: {{GA|02:55, 20 February 2011 (UTC)|nominator=—[[User:Ed!|<font color="black">'''Ed!'''</font>]]^{[[User talk:Ed!|<font color="black">'''(talk)'''</font>]]}|page=1|topic=War and military|status=onreview|note=}} and wait for the bot to run, say twice, and see if it removes the article as a "pass". Oh, and read the instructions next time, its far easier that way. Pyrotec (talk) 09:05, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah. It recognized it passed and fixed my mistake. Been so long since I've reviewed: note to self: read instructions when long time passes between the same activity. NativeForeigner ^Talk/_Contribs 19:00, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Orphan eligibility

I am curious as to whether an orphan such as Rose Catherine Pinkney is eligible for WP:GA.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 18:29, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Of course. Malleus Fatuorum 18:49, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

I think I may have deorphaned it by linking it from two articles.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 21:57, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Second opinion needed

I want a second opinion on the review for Steph Cunningham. More it's probably best if it is someone who have reviewed a fictional character article before. The review it recieved is impossible. Asking for all the storylines to be sourced when it's not a requirement per the MOS. Everytime I change something the editor desputes it.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 21:36, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

More so, I'd prefer a whole new review to work with. So I am asking for someone to discard whats been done so far, and start a fresh.RAIN*the*ONE ^BAM 21:38, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Proposed tweak to review instructions

I propose that WP:Good article nominations/guidelines#How to review an articlebe amended: Current text:

# On the article talk page, follow the link in the {{GA nominee}} template to start a review subpage. Leave an initial comment, and save that subpage.

Proposed new text:

# On this page follow the Start Review link in the {{GAN entry}} template to start a review subpage. If you like, leave an initial comment, one line below the automatically inserted reviewer signature and timestamp and save that subpage. The GANbot will then change WP:GAN to indicate that you are reviewing the article.

My reasons for resuggesting this are that many reviewers enter text above the reviewer signature and timestamp which the bot cannot parse. Improvements to this propsed wording welcome. Jezhotwells (talk) 11:16, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Sounds good; add it in. Hopefully people will actually pay attention to that. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 20:26, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

OK, done. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:57, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Overanxious nominators

I have been having issues lately at both GAN and DYK where random editors have descended upon my freshly written articles and nominated without talking to me first. In the case of my latest creation, Conservation of slow lorises, I was going to spend the evening touching it up before nominating it. However, I was tired when I came home from work and fell asleep. After waking up, I have discovered that someone nominated it for me. I left a note on the nominator's talk page, but I was wondering how best to handle this in the future. This is becoming an increasingly frequent problem, and it's not just one editor that's doing it. A lot of times, I finish writing articles at 3am, and although I have now started making sure that I stay up to complete the DYK nomination to avoid this issue, the last thing I want to do is either stay up even later to prepare my work for GAN or delay publication until the article is 100% ready for GAN. – VisionHolder « talk » 09:38, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure I see the problem? There's a significant backlog and both my GANs have taken many weeks to get a review, so there should be plenty of time to make changes before it gets anywhere near a reviewer.--Korruski^Talk 10:31, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

That's not always the case. Some articles can be reviewed almost as soon as they hit the queue, and there's also the issue that the reviewer might not inform the main author the review in under way. The article might even be a long way away from the point where the main author thinks it is ready for GA, or they may intend to put the article through other processes instead. Apterygial 10:44, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Apterygial has stated my concerns concisely. Also, there can be the issue of credit. If I clean up the article and it's given a quick pass, it may appear on the surface that the GA credit would go to the nominator, and not the author. – VisionHolder « talk » 12:29, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

That's a fair point. It's definitely common courtesy to talk to an article's main contributor before nominating it for anything. But, I suppose most people assume they are doing you a favour, so it doesn't occur to them. Maybe it should be mandatory when nominating an article that you are not the main contributor to, just as it would be if you were CSD or PRODing it?--Korruski^Talk 13:08, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

That said, although I completely understand VisionHolder's concerns (and would probably feel the same myself) you have to remember that you don't own the article, however much you contributed, and it is within the rights of any user to nominate it for GA. Obviously, if credit is not then properly given, that would be an issue.--Korruski^Talk 13:11, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

You are correct: I don't own the article. But we appear to agree that there could be issues of credit at stake here, as well as other concerns. The question is how do we address the issue? Can we add a note to the nomination instructions that if a potential nominator is not the is not major contributor to the article, that he/she get in touch with the primary editor first? – VisionHolder « talk » 13:17, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm a little confused by the idea of credit here, as far as I'm aware, there is no GA equivalent of WP:WBFLN/WP:WBFAN that tracks such things. In general, I don't rally like the idea of someone who hasn't worked on the article at all putting up the GA nom, especially on a brand new article; but I'm wary of any formal rule to that effect, as I'm absolutely convinced that there are articles out there that would be credible GA candidates either now, where the primary author doesn't tend to make GA/FC noms, or where a couple hours of cleaning is all that is required. Gosh, run-on sentence alert. Bottom line, someone shouldn't rush to nominate an article, but we also don't need a formal rule requiring a nominator to be a "significant contributor" as FA and FL do (which unfortunately tends to get judged by running it through the edit counter, a bad approach). Courcelles 13:47, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

The FOUR award is a nice token of recognition for the author that intends to take a new article that they've created through DYK, GA, and eventually FAC (which is Visionholder's intention here, as part of a WP:MAMMALS group collaboration), and it requires that he be credited for achieving each of these stages. That being said, if the GA nominator refuses to relinquish their nomination (which, under our current setup, is perfectly within their right), I don't see why you couldn't add your name to the nomination, especially since you'ld be the one with access to all the sources, and answering the technical questions. Sasata (talk) 14:35, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Aaah, the FOUR award, didn't consider that... Hmm, adding his name to the nomination template is a good solution, and the extra work needed ought to be doable with the month+ backlog here. Courcelles 14:44, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

One of the main criteria of the FOUR award, in assessing who gets credit for the GA, as I recall, is who responds to the feedback that almost all GA noms get. It's still not a complete answer, as the last thing you want is to be competing with a nominator to respond to feedback, but in theory if you are the one to fix any issues that are flagged, and respond to the comments, then you should be able to claim the credit when it comes to applying for a WP:FOUR. In theory, anyway.--Korruski^Talk 15:00, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

A good article may not be exaustive as a featured one, but it should be complete, not a work in progress. If someone can point that it's still incomplete at important issues, then the nomination should fail. We can not accept the main contributor approving the article he wrote (whoever nominated it), for clear bias reasons, but if he points that the article is still incomplete (thus denying himself a "recognition") the most likely thing is that he is correct, and we shouldn't dismiss his opinion for a mere technicality.

It is also important to have in mind that "failed nomination" templates may be discouraging. In those cases of passing-by nominations rejected by the main contributor, it may be better to simply remove the nomination, not listing it in the article history.

Note: All this applies for main contributors that oppose the nomination. Cases when the main contributor does not care about the process, or when he is not in Wikipedia any longer, are different things. In those cases, the nominator should be able to answer to any potencial concern about the article, as if he was the main contributor. MBelgrano (talk) 14:19, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

So what's the concensus here? Add my name to the nomination (and if so, where exactly?) Revert the nomination? Either way, I plan to finish up the article tonight. All that needs to be done is a proofread/copyedit. Also, I want to add a few pictures that need to be uploaded from Flickr. – VisionHolder « talk » 19:42, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Why bother? Just leave the review up or append a note that you'd like a hold if someone was going to review it now. I think you're focusing too much on "your" work here. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 20:03, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I'd say don't worry as well. If people are reviewing articles nom'd the same day, then they're the ones that need to modify their focus. We got ones that are three months waiting.. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 20:22, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

"Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise/(That last infirmity of noble mind)/To scorn delights, and live laborious days" (Milton's "Lycidas"). It's human nature, and WP:DYK explicitly gives credit to one editor. Unfortunately the same human nature can lead to credit-stealing. In the short term, editors who've found their work nominated by another can avoid recurrences by working in a sub-page. --Philcha (talk) 20:35, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Visionholder was working in a subpage, he only moved it to the mainspace yesterday! The nom made three edits, all of which were (correctly) reverted. An editor who knows little/has little experience on a complex subject maybe shouldn't be taking it through GAN. Then again maybe the editor was unaware of the situation and just saw an article that deserved to be a GA? Either way I feel Visionholder should really be getting sole credit for the GA, I would have thought it will pass easily and very little need to be done. Jack (talk) 22:52, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Tony Blair

Talk:Tony Blair/GA1 was originally created by an IP vandal and then deleted. Is subsequently came along and started the review properly, but the bot is listing the IP as the reviewer and reverted my edit (which is seriously bad form for a bot to be doing) when I changed it to my signature. Why is the bot the sole maintainer of GAN and why is it overriding human editors? And how do I get it to list me as the reviewer and not some IP vandal? HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 00:39, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Does the bot have admin rights? If so, is it seeing the first (deleted) version of the page and taking it as the current page? Jappalang (talk) 06:35, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I just looked over the php code for the bot. It is not a sysop, but it looks to me like it uses a database to store information, and once the reviewer and subtopic info go into the database, the bot takes them from there and ignores anything else. I am going to leave a message on harej's talk page explaining the problem. Looie496 (talk) 07:26, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

What would it do if I restored the vandal's edit and moved it somewhere else and then restored it with just my review? HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:54, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I'm not enough of a php coder to be certain I'm reading the code correctly, but it looks to me like the only thing you could do to force a change would be to start a new review (GA2). I think this is probably something harej has to fix. Looie496 (talk) 18:58, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I added a note to reflect that the reviewer is not the IP user; I hope that at least works as a form of temporary solution to this... Jappalang (talk) 02:51, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Hopefully this is now resolved. Geometry guy 00:39, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Bot problems persist?

I started a review of South Carolina v. Catawba Indian Tribe and the WP:GAN page link changed to "discuss review" instead of "start review". However, the bot did not change the status parameter of the talk page template to onreview or add the transclusion of the review page. I have manually added onreview and transcluded the review page in the hope that it will kickstart the robot into acknowledging the presence of the review. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Racepacket (talk • contribs) 19:44, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Patience is a virtue, the bot has updated to "on hold" by yourself. It sometimes takes 30+ minutes to update. Jezhotwells (talk) 02:16, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Tokyo

The article on Tokyo was just nominated and while I don't review articles, and don't want too, I just looked at the article and noticed that a reviewer shouldn't even take the time to look at it. This article should have never been nominated. It's currently rated as a C and I don't even know if it would be a B. Large parts of the article, including full paragraphs and full sections, are not referenced once and there are multiple "citations needed" in other areas. I have an article here that I have been waiting to get reviewed which has already been skipped over by another article and I don't like the thought that it could be looked over again for an article that should have never been nominated. Newfoundlander&Labradorian (talk) 16:25, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Removed the nom tag from the talk page. No reason to give a full review when it fails a surface test as you said. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:01, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

LivingBot

It appears that the bot may have fallen over so it would be wise to manually update the Wikipedia:Good articles/recent page. I have informed User:Jarry1250. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:10, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Reviews in need of attention

I've come across a few GA reviews from User:GreatOrangePumpkin (talk | contribs), and have concerns. The first I've seen got somewhat out of hand on the respective users' talk pages, although the nominator (now indeffed) certainly had a part to play in that. But he then summarily promoted this nomination, and is on the verge of promoting Aruba at the 2008 Summer Olympics. I'm not sure if there are any other GANs that will need looking at. For what it's worth, I am convinced that he is an enthusiastic young editor acting in good faith, as demonstrated by his efforts at Golden Eagle Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Regards, —WFC— 08:22, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

The first GAN was not "out of hand"; I withdraw it because of personal attack, and that was correct. The second is a small article and I could review it in a few minutes. The third is also a tiny article; done in a few minutes. If you have issues, then write instead on my talk page and not in other user/article talk pages.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 11:40, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

I value my eyes. For the record, the aforementioned article has been promoted, with 203 words of readable prose. —WFC— 12:02, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, 203 words are enough to promote an article about two independent sportsmen from an independent island, named Aruba, located somewhere in the Caribbean Sea. Size is not the most important thing.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 12:09, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Oh, BTW, I still don't understand why you oppose this here; everything seems to be resolved in my opinion.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 12:13, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

I haven't looked at the reviews in any detail, but I would be slightly concerned that you (GreatOrangePumpkin) might not be able to judge GA criterion 1a very well, as you claim to have an "intermediate level" understanding of English, which may have caused some problems in at least the first review mentioned. Also, from the FLC you link to above, it doesn't seem that you have a good understanding of what makes a source reliable. I do agree with WFCforLife though that you are acting in good faith and are trying to help out the project. You're obviously very enthusiastic. Maybe it'd be better to stick to creating content for a while rather than reviewing, or only reviewing where you're not the only reviewer (eg. at WP:FLC). That way you can still be helpful, but wouldn't have to have the responsibility of making a final decision. What do you think? --BelovedFreak 12:22, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Ok, I didn't realise this was Wikicup-related. --BelovedFreak 14:21, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Clearly I'm an involved editor here, and for that reason it would be inappropriate for me to initiate a reassessment. But could someone please look at the latter two articles that I've mentioned. Aruba at the 2008 Summer Olympics is a well structured, 200 word stub. If that's now par for the course at GA, might I suggest that we scrap the review process, and just promote everything that is fully referenced? —WFC— 08:21, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

No need to reassess it. Posting your suggestions here is far simpler than reasses it. An article can get the GA status if they meet the criteria; no single word of the size.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 10:03, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, size doesn't automatically disqualify an article, but when something's that short then it's obvious that not all the info is covered, and as such it has no business being a GA. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 18:29, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

What do you mean with "not all infomation is covered"? It includes every information about the country Aruba at the 2008 Summer Olympics. What do you want to say; a stub can be a GA, if it meets the criteria, or am I wrong? The goal is to promote articles which meets the criteria, and that's everything. Please convince me that I am not right here.-- ♫Greatorangepumpkin♫ T 19:41, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

I of course welcome other views, but I have read repeatedly that size is not a GA criteria. So long as the article is not a "stub", it is eligible for GA promotion. So a well-sourced article with footnotes that is comprehensive should pass even if it is only 250 words. I would ask what other facts about the 2008 Aruba Olympic team are worthy of coverage? GA is different from FAC which is supposed to represent Wikipedia's "best work." GA reviewers just mechanically apply the criteria and try to inspire our fellow editors to do their best with each article. I don't see the GA reviewer's role as passing judgment on the worthiness of the topic. This is particularly true of biographies. A former US President should have a very long biography to earn a GA. However, someone who is notable but otherwise obscure could have a GA biography if his entire life is comprehensively explained in just five or six well-sourced paragraphs. The GA criteria turns on how available material is forged into a Wikipedia article rather than how much material is available. Racepacket (talk) 20:02, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

You completely discredit yourself by applying that reasoned argument to an article with (stripping away the infobox) three two-line paragraphs, and a three-line lead summarising those six lines. The article is a stub, there are no two ways about it. —WFC— 07:30, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Back to the root problem, I suggest that what we need is a new WP:RFR process, modelled on the WP:RFA process that works so well in selecting new administrators. Malleus Fatuorum 23:04, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Apologies for my apparent denseness, but...RFR? That's new alphabet soup for me. Dana boomer (talk) 23:11, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Requests for reviewership. Malleus Fatuorum 23:28, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Malleus, you're about a month too early for April Fools. Imzadi 1979 → 23:34, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

It's April Fools every day here. Malleus Fatuorum 00:03, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Ah. Guess I ruined the joke by needing it explained... :) Dana boomer (talk) 00:08, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

You did. But as you're one of those ever so rare female editors, far more more valuable than us easily replaceable males, then I forgive you. ;-) Malleus Fatuorum 01:01, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Back to the topic, it's a stub, and promoting stubs as "good articles" is clearly incorrect. This needs to be addressed, and quickly, before it further undermines the GAN process. The Rambling Man (talk) 10:22, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

I agree in that a biography of an obscure man may be a good article, if the information about him is properly organized... on the mere level of the hypothetical ideas. In the discussion hold here, this does not apply to the specific Aruba at the 2008 Summer Olympics. There's not even a single important paragraph bigger than three sentences. MBelgrano (talk) 11:43, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not concerned about the brevity of the paragraphs, as there were only 2 athletes. However, like Wizardman, I think the coverage has gaps. For example: how the athletes were selected (e.g. if Aruba wanted to send more, but some IOC rule prevented them); how the athletes (and officials?) were financed / sponsored; how much interested did the Aruba media and public show during the selection and games and when the athletes returned. --Philcha (talk) 12:18, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Imzadi1979 (talk · contribs) has carried out a reassessment at Talk:Aruba at the 2008 Summer Olympics/GA2 and delisted the article. I agree with his comments and those above about additional material that one would expect to see in the article for it to meet the requirement of providing broad coverage of the topic. Bencherlite^Talk 12:23, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual of Style (layout) discourages the use of very short paragraphs. Regardless of the topic, sections with just 1 small paragraph do not follow this MOS guideline. MBelgrano (talk) 12:46, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

• I have put the Lula article on a reassesment. The nominator agrees and states that he was considering a GAR as he was disapointed with the article. See here for review and feel free to add comments. KnowIG (talk) 09:43, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

2nd opinion request

I could do with a second opinion at Talk:Mince pie/GA1 if anyone has the time. Thanks. Jezhotwells (talk) 12:51, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Beyond the call of duty?

Hi, I am not certain whether my role at Talk:Case Closed/GA1 has gone beyond what a reviewer should have done. Could any veteran GA reviewer take a look and advise? Jappalang (talk) 03:14, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

I say it's fine, just as long as you're not the one actually doing the restructure of the article, merely providing the suggestion. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 19:44, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Timeline

Can this article be eligible for Good article nomination? I have been told that "Timeline of..." article has ever gone through GAN. -- The Egyptian Liberal (talk) 10:10, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

It is a list class article so the answer is no. The good article criteria is clear on this. Jezhotwells (talk) 11:33, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Ryan Johansen

I've just reviewed this article. Nice little article. Definatly will be a GA either if he does the improvements or in the future. My issue is. Is this GAC a bit too early. Is the article just a bit too much of a stub. I've hinted this in the review, and want to know what others thought before promoting/declining. KnowIG (talk) 21:27, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Well your review doesn't appear to have checked against the six WP:GACR so it is hard to determine. Jezhotwells (talk) 05:59, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

You can tell it does. You don't need the critia to basically hold your hand. Picture fine. On topic yes makes sense yes. References fine. Stable yes. netural yes. So why are you getting funny when it's obvious to see that it meets the rationale. I am asking about the lengh so answer the question instead of getting funny. KnowIG (talk) 09:57, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

II find that it is always best to spell out where an article does and does not meeet the criteria. Length of an article is not a criterion. Broadness of coverage is. I noticed:

• Nonetheless, he played in Port Moody at the double-A level through to bantam,[1] including a peewee provincial championship I know little about ice-hockey and this reads as complete gobbledy-gook. Good plain english is required, not a mass of sports jargon.
• He was offered a full scholarship to play college hockey with Northeastern University but later chose to play in the Western Hockey League (WHL) instead, costing him his eligibility to play for a National Collegiate Athletic Association school. Poorl;y written.
• With a base salary of $900,000, the deal could reach $1.975 per year if he reaches all his bonus incentives "$1.975 per year" doesn't sound like much to me!
• Attending his first NHL training camp that month, he was later returned to Portland on October 2 for another year of junior. very poor prose.

Jezhotwells (talk) 10:07, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

And I've highlighted 3 of the points you've stated. I've ask for and expansion on the first one and definitions. Second agree with you I've left it to him though. And the last one agreed as well with you. Only the third one yep your right needs million added. But these can all be sorted quickly, but whether it is a stub is the tricky bit to judge. See further up the page for the fall out of someone sticking 2 short ones up. KnowIG (talk) 17:25, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

This article would be fine to pass as a GA. It's actually pretty comprehensive seeing how he's just starting his career. It's far longer than the article above at least. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:34, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Wizardman KnowIG (talk) 09:27, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Because You Left GA review

I reviewed the Lost article Because You Left and feel it is ready for promotion as a GA. However, there is a minor ongoing edit war over four small words, which several anonymous IP users feel should be included. As I'm not accustomed to dealing with edit wars, I thought I would seek a second opinion. Is the issue so trivial that I should ignore it and pass the article for GA anyway? The consensus on the article's talkpage leans against the words' inclusion, but the issue was never completely resolved (and one IP user continues to edit the article, adding the same four words over and over again). A second opinion would be appreciated. Thanks, Ruby2010 talk 03:03, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Since no one responded negatively, I went ahead and passed the article for GA. Ruby2010 talk 18:27, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Reviews need deleting

Could someone please delete Talk:Vision of Love/GA1 and Talk:Hillel Slovak/GA1, as they were inadvertently created by someone who is not intending to review. --BelovedFreak 22:05, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Done per WP:CSD#G6. –Grondemar 22:25, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Netball

Can some one please help facilitate the netball GA? The reviewer cited bias but won't present any information regarding bias so we can work to fix it. I showed it to people in #wikipedia-en-help and no one saw the bias there either. The reviewer said the article is too stuffed with information. They didn't say the article had too much random trivia and articles are supposed to be comprehensive about their subject. He's asked for tables to be removed that other people who have gone through the GA process have repeatedly assured me are acceptable and important for the article. The reviewer has asked for information that doesn't exist (the number of players by continent, historical styles of play) to be included in the article. He's extended the time out for doing this, against my request because I don't feel we can address his concerns in a timely manner. I feel we've reached an impasse and I want the article failed so that we can get a new reviewer in who can be more helpful. It isn't like we haven't tried. We've made this level of editing to try to conform to his requests. I think we're both first timers at this process so I'm a bit lost with how to proceed. --LauraHale (talk) 23:29, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

I've sought additional clarity. According to the reviewer, questions I've asked in trying to get clarity are flawed. I still don't understand what the reviewer wants. :( If he said: "The Oceania section is too long. Condense it to three paragraphs. The first should talk about the organization in the region. The second should talk about the major powers in the area. The third should talk about a notable bit of history in the region." <-- That I could figure out what to do with. I tried to make it smaller. I had all the sections by region down to about six paragraphs at one point but it still wasn't acceptable. I didn't get any feedback on how to improve. Most of the article reviews I've seen have provided some feedback that provided examples of the text that needs to be improved. I want to get it to good article status. I'm willing to make the edits to get there, even if it involves cutting large amounts of text. I just need guidance on how to do that. --LauraHale (talk) 10:01, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

There is no bias. See your talk. KnowIG (talk) 10:05, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Reviewer Said it Passed GA Bot Says Failed

I went looking in history to see if a submission of mine passed or failed, I saw that it failed. I added GA1 to the talk page to find the review. Link here: http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Talk:Tet_Offensive/GA1

What? This says passed? Help please. --Iankap99 (talk) 03:00, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

[7] Reviewer removed the GA nominee template without adding the GA template. Gimmetoo (talk) 03:04, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

(ec) The reviewer removed the {{GAN}} template from the talk page., but didn't add either {{GA}} or {{ArticleHistory}}. The bot didn't know that the article passed because it relies on one of those two templates to know the article passed. As a side node, the reviewer also down-graded the article from A-Class to GA-Class, which is lower on the WP 1.0 scale, and separate from the GA Status conferred by a GAN review. Imzadi 1979 → 03:05, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

So can you fix both of these please? I would myself but I don't know how. --Iankap99 (talk) 03:18, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

It appears fixed. Thank you all for your help with this, --Iankap99 (talk) 03:21, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Review needs deleting

Talk:Love Story (Taylor Swift song)/GA1 was created by an unregistered user, who is not allowed to do a GA review. An admin declined speedy, but is there way to get it deleted quicker than through WP:MFD? Adabow (talk · contribs) 03:32, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

A registered user took over as reviewer. harej 22:36, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Timeline of the Fukushima nuclear accidents/GA1

Can someone delete this page. It was a premature GAN nomination, which I quick failed. The nominator had started the review page. Jezhotwells (talk) 02:30, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

BTW the nomination template has been deleted from the article talk page. Jezhotwells (talk) 02:32, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Deleted. Nikkimaria (talk) 02:42, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Nikki. Jezhotwells (talk) 17:25, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Heads up on 11 GA reviews to be requested in the beginning of April, 2011

Students in a course I teach on Communication in Groups and Organizations have been working on 11 articles relevant to this topic, with the goal of getting them to GA status by the beginning of April. The list of articles is here. I wanted to alert potential reviewers that the students will be making requests to have their articles review starting on April 4th. I was hoping to reserve some time from reviewers during April to handle this load. Thanks. Robertekraut (talk) 13:40, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

• Commnet: There is currently a backlog elimination drive going on throughout March, so you may find that reviews slow down considerably after that as some reviewers may be burnt out. In don't want to rain on your parade, but that is a likely reaction to a drive. also april is not such a good time as it is Easter vacaction. I am also puzzled by how article can be got to GA status by the beinning of April if request are going to be made from 4th April. Did you mean "beginning of May"? Thanks for letting us know anyway. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:22, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
• Reply: Sorry if I wasn't clear. Students will have reworked the articles and are hoping to post their nomination by the beginning of April to get a determination by the beginning of May. I certainly understand that reviewers may be burnt out or off duty because of vacation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Robertekraut (talk • contribs) 18:50, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

On the other hand, reviewers might get to those articles earlier than usual because the backlog is smaller now than it was before the drive began. Gary King (talk · scripts) 22:21, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

I will keep an eye out for the noms. Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 16:49, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Famine in India/GA3

Can this be deleted? As the page history shows, this review was accidentally started. Jezhotwells (talk) 08:13, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks HJM. Jezhotwells (talk) 19:47, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

In case of confusion, I have now completed a review, hence the blue link. Jezhotwells (talk) 10:10, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Netball in the Cook Islands/GA3

There is something that warrants close scrutiny occuring in the netball articles. User:LauraHale is from Illinois and understands American English. She nominated both Netball and Netball in the Cook Islands for GA. Talk:Netball in the Cook Islands/GA1 was reviewed by Canadian Paul who failed it on March 11 because "the overall structure of the article needs to be redone and that extends beyond the reach of a seven day hold." Five hours later, she renominated it and I reviewed it in Talk:Netball in the Cook Islands/GA2. Although we are both from Illinois, LauraHale claimed that she did not understand what I was saying. She insisted that when I said "women's basketball" that I meant "netball" because in a few countries up until 1970, some people called netball women's basketball even though my meaning was clear from my statements. She repeatedly assured me that she understood that an "Olympic sport" was one that was played in the Olympic games, and then repeatedly revised the article to state that netball was an "Olympic sport", when in fact it was only recognized by the International Olympic Committee as a "sport" and was not a part of the Olympic Games schedule. After giving her one last opportunity to address important concerns, I failed the article on March 20 stating that it needed a careful rewrite to eliminate POV. A few hours later, without the rewrite, she nominated it a third time and Talk:Netball in the Cook Islands/GA3 is being reviewed by User:Hawkeye7. I am seeking clarification because Hawkeye7 made substantial contributions to both this article (diff and diff) and the main Netball article as well. So I am wondering if he would be allowed to review the article under the rule, "you cannot review an article if you have made significant contributions to it prior to the review."

In the meantime, LauraHale also nominated Netball on March 5 and User:Bill william compton started Talk:Netball/GA1. Although Bill made good efforts to communicate with LauraHale, he ran into similar WP:HEAR problems, and he put out the call for a second opinion. I volunteered to take over that review on March 13. We are still working through the concerns with that article.

What is the proper procedure to handle a reviewer who made recent substantial edits? Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 06:27, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I have now raised the concern on the reviewer's talk page, and left specific examples of problems in Talk:Netball in the Cook Islands/GA3, and we will see what happens. Racepacket (talk) 15:19, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Drive by nom

Someone has nominated this Isner–Mahut match at the 2010 Wimbledon Championships. Now Ok. Fine whatever you may say. The problem is the article is ok but could be a lot better. And I bet that whoever reviews this will have to do a load of work to it. Please someone chuck it out, so that it can be improved at the right people get credit. Cheers. KnowIGhas (talk) 00:07, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

The right people get credit? That's not the point. Either the article does (or will shortly) meet the criteria, in which case all's well that ends well, or it doesn't (or won't, before the reviewer loses patience), in which case it will fail. It doesn't have to reach its maximum potential, and it doesn't have to be nommed by the person who wrote most of it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:02, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Isner–Mahut match at the 2010 Wimbledon Championships is the work of a few registered editors and at least 2 IPs. Neither the nominator nor KnowIG has contributed. In this case, if the review results in a "Pass" WP's a little better off. However, if it fails, there may be no-one to may the improvements suggested in the review, and the reviewer's time could be wasted - and the backlog is causing concern again. In the circumstances, as a would-be reviewer I could avoid the article, and look to review articles that have more commitment behind them.

I also disagree with "The right people get credit? That's not the point." In the long term, WP will benefit from editors who enjoy credit and are motivated to do more, rather than any who pinch the credit but do little of the work. --Philcha (talk) 18:26, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I contributed but it got reverted I think. But it was months ago. KnowIG (talk) 23:02, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

How exactly does one "pinch the credit"? What "credit" are you talking about? Wikipedia doesn't keep special records that list who gets "credit" for working on, nominating, or reviewing a GA. We list solely the article at WP:GA, not the authors. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:19, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing, it seems KnowIG and I both value getting credit for our work. I keep a of GAs I've nominated and on which I'm done the majority of the work (and I note other editors who've contributed to the push to GA). As I said above, I think WP will benefit from editors who enjoy credit and are motivated to do more. --Philcha (talk) 12:26, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Sure, but if I happen to nom your excellent article five seconds before you get around to it, do you get any less credit for writing it? I think it's great for you to be proud of your work. I simply don't see how having someone else's name down as the nominator on this page during the review process takes even the smallest bit of credit away from you. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:37, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

I'd be slightly annoyed, to be honest, and nothing to do with credit (I would know how much work I'd put into an article, so that's the main thing there...) If I'd put a lot of work into getting an article up to GA standard though, I'd want to be the one nominating it and responding to reviewer concerns. It's part of the whole process and not only do I enjoy that bit too, it helps with the development of the article. Yes, I could still observe comments and help address concerns if you have nominated it, but I would feel a little put out. Maybe it's silly, but we are only human. I haven't nominated an article based on someone else's work before but if I happened on an excellent article that I thought could be GA, I think I'd take a couple of minutes to check and see if work is currently taking place on it, whether there are any main contributers and if there are, ask them "Hey, are you planning on nominating this article for GA? If not, maybe I will." If someone's in the middle of working on the article, they may have an important bit of content to add and are just waiting to get hold of a new source or something. It's worth finding out, and in my opinion, if they're planning on nominating it, it's polite to let them. As a reviewer, I prefer to review articles nominated by the main contributers because they are generally more motivated to make any necessary changes, and are likely to be familiar with sources etc. Of course, there are plenty of articles hanging around that haven't been edited for a while and aren't headed to GA. If someone nominates such an article on the offchance of it passing, then no problem. --BelovedFreak 22:06, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Why wouldn't you be responding to the GA reviewer at any article that interests you? All editors at an article are supposed to be involved in the review, including people who just happen to be passing by.

We seem to have developed this idea that the GA process is an OWN-violating two-person, invitation-only dance. This is wrong, and we need to stop thinking like that. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:45, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

That is exactly how I perceive the process is supposed to work, but rarely turns out that way. Thegreatdr (talk) 02:59, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Disruptive reviewer: Netball

I figured I would put this here for the record. I with my nomination for Good Article status for netball. The most recent reviewer insisted on putting in factually incorrect information (about the history of netball and about the Olympics) and a whole set of other issues. The most appalling of which for me included making unsubstantiated allegations of plagiarism and insisting that the burden of proof was on me to prove that I didn't: He wanted me to scan book sources I had used and e-mail the pages from those sources to him. Given this appalling, factually incorrect allegation that the reviewer could not support, given that we'd bent over backwards to try to meet his demands and we weren't making any headway (and the article was actually degrading), I decided it was time to retract it. When we put this article back up for good review later, I would really appreciate any support to insure that he does not review the article again. --LauraHale (talk) 08:54, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

User:LauraHale now has a track record of finding great fault with three different GA reviewers instead of focusing on addressing the problems in the nominated articles. Besides me, she had diffculties with Canadian Paul at Talk:Netball in the Cook Islands/GA1 which failed the article, and she quickly renominated it and got me as the reviewer. When I raised grammar issues, she claimed that New Zealand grammar is different from the rest of the world. I also had to fail the article. She renominated it within hours with few new changes and another active editor agreed to review it. She had difficulties with User:Bill william compton the first reviewer in Talk:Netball/GA1, so I volunteered to take that over (before I took on the Cook Islands review). We eventually had difficulties because she insisted that "Olympic sport" means something different in British English than what is described in the Wikipedia article. I then brought in British editor User:Off2riorob who confirmed that the British and American meanings were the same and offered examples of how another sport handled the same status as Netball. She then offered to withdraw, have the work continue and have someone else renominate it in a week. I countered that we could keep the article on hold because there were several people other than her working on the article. Many volunteer hours have been wasted, and I hope that we can bring the current nomination to an amicable conclusion quickly.

To address the worst distortion of her post, "The most appalling of which for me included making unsubstantiated allegations of plagiarism and insisting that the burden of proof was on me to prove that I didn't: He wanted me to scan book sources I had used and e-mail the pages from those sources to him." I raised a concern about checking the article for "close paraphrasing." I proposed to check the sources that were available on line, and asked that whether someone would be willing to have me designate a sample set of page from the sources that are not available on line and email them to me. This concern was prompted from reading the older talk page entries which proposed to copy over the player position descriptions from the Australia Netball website. I have posted an example of a close paraphrase in the review, and she has posted a long block quote there explaining that close paraphrase is appropriate. When none of the editors volunteers to scan a few sample pages, I agreed to go to the Library of Congress. Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 17:18, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

To address distruption the nominator closed it. Racepacket reopened it and carryied on with his link of questioning. Not everyone race has your issue and can quote and source properly. Stop POV pushing racepacket your in the wrong. KnowIG (talk) 17:38, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Could you name one substantive issue (for example, the definition of Olympic sport where you have disagreed with me? Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 03:02, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Netball is not an Olympic sport: We disagree there. The article provides numerous citations that netball is an Olympic sport. --LauraHale (talk) 07:00, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Edited to add having not read the comments above: I finally withdrew the request. The article assessment wasn't going any where. We couldn't make the changes to the article to appease the reviewer. It had been open for close to three weeks. The article quality was beginning to degrade. I felt the review needed to be withdrawn to give us time to make improvements to the article. I asked three individuals who have worked on Good Articles before how to withdraw my request as the procedure was not outlined. They told me that I needed to change the status to failed, leave a not saying I withdrew the request in the edit summary, and add a section to the article talk page to say why I withdrew it. I followed this procedure. Racepacket re-opened the review, claiming that I could not withdraw my request. I am under the impression from the Good article nomination page that editors cannot be forced to go through the Good article process against their will. Thus, Racepacket re-opening it in violation of my request otherwise feels very intrusive and like it puts unfair requirements on me as an editor. --LauraHale (talk) 21:33, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

If you want to withdraw it for good and Racepacket keeps opening it I would contact ANI and get an admin to force the discussion to stay closed. --Rschen7754 21:37, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

FOr the record I've just shut it again. KnowIG (talk) 21:41, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

IP reviewer?

Per the GAN page, all reviewers should be reigstered, but an article I nominated, Rosa Mendes is currently being reviewed by an IP. What, if anything, should be done? NiciVampireHeart 14:58, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Let's see first if it's a user that simply forgot to log in (or whose login expired while doing the review, it happens sometimes). If he isn't, I guess the review page would have to be deleted. Nevertheless, if this unregistered user thinks that a section is lacking content, it wouldn't harm to check a few more sources, to confirm that there's no more to add, unless you have already searched for that info while writing it. MBelgrano (talk) 22:15, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Timeline of the 2011 Egyptian revolution (pre-Mubarak's resignation)

Is this article eligible to be a GA or not? -- 07:35, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Don't see how nominating it would be a problem since the section of time you are talking about has stop evolving since he has resigned, and you have a separate article for this period. KnowIG (talk) 08:24, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

because Dana boomer was not sure that a "Timeline of..." article has ever gone through GAN so Dana asked me to see if it was not a problem. -- The Egyptian Liberal (talk) 02:22, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

"Timeline of..." articles are usually lists and lists are not eligible for GA status as stated at Wikipedia:Good article criteria. --maclean (talk) 02:40, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Then can you take a look at the article and see if its a list of not? -- The Egyptian Liberal (talk) 13:40, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual of Style (stand-alone lists) suggests that "Timeline of..." articles are lists. I am not aware of any "Timeline of..." Good Articles. There are numerous "Timeline of..." articles at Wikipedia:Featured lists and none at Wikipedia:Featured articles. This specific article straddles an awkward middle ground between article and list. The content is currently organized like a list but this article goes beyond a listing of events and includes some background, explanations, analysis, etc. My feeling is that this could be split into a more traditional timeline of events and a "Protests during the 2011 Egyptian revolution" article or some such. maclean (talk) 15:35, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

We already have Timeline of the 2011 Egyptian revolution that is more traditional timeline of events. -- The Egyptian Liberal (talk) 11:34, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

GA bot auto failure

I nominated an article and the GA Bot failed it very quickly. I probably made a mistake in my nomination or there was probably one little tiny formatting error in the article that the immediately recognized and failed it on just that. If the article is not good enough, I want this article, One Bayfront Plaza delisted as a good article. It is way out of date and some facts are incorrect. The article I tried to nominate is Port of Miami Tunnel, a well covered and well known development in South Florida. I think there might be some tiny reference formatting error that triggered the bot. No way a bot can give a fair review of such a thing. I will nominate it one more time to see if the same thing happens again. I'm not sure if having a good article status really means anything, but for what it's worth, I guess I think it meets the criteria and might as well be one. Daniel Christensen (talk) 05:51, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Nevermind, I was doing it wrong, no surprises there. Daniel Christensen (talk) 07:08, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes the page does have a notice saying "You no longer need to update this page. Read the FAQ for more details. Report glitches to the talk page.". Just placing the template on the article talk page should get the nomination copied to the WP:GAN page within 30 minutes or so. With regard to the One Bayfront Plaza article, you can nominate for community re-assessment at WP:GA (instructions there, or you could just place {{GA request}} on the article talk page and add a comment on the talk page highlighting why you think it does not meet the good article criteria. Jezhotwells (talk) 13:32, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

KnowIG

Just noticed when I went to check on the status of one of my in-progress reviews, that this user (KnowIG) has been banned. He has several reviews underway, and I am not sure what the protocol is in these cases. Canada Hky (talk) 02:16, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Typically, we desperately beg people to take over. In this case, the user is confidently asserting that he'll talk his way out of the block before long. It looks like the list is currently:

• Aaron Peirsol (sports/BLP)
• Stade Roland Garros (sports location)
• Legacy of Leonid Brezhnev (history)
• Battle of Yongsan — Dana Boomer has kindly taken over (history)

These aren't really subjects I'd want to tackle myself, but I hope that others will have the time and necessary expertise to take them on. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:08, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I would be willing to have a go at the Roland Garros AIRcorn (talk) 06:31, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Someone was nice enough to finish up the review for Keith Aulie, so I will take over the Aaron Peirsol review. Canada Hky (talk) 14:09, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Aircorn and Canada Hky. That leaves us with just Legacy of Leonid Brezhnev in need of a new reviewer. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:55, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Reviewing templates

Template:GAN/subst doesn't seem to be getting subst'd into the GA subpage any more. Is this deliberate?

I discovered this anomaly when looking through the templates. Based on the comments above, I think that it might useful to include a brief statement that "All editors interested in improving this article are invited to participate in the review." WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:17, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Regarding the first question, I am not aware of any change: Template:GAN/preload adds the template substitution to the edit window. Do you have further information about the anomaly you found?

I like the second suggestion. Geometry guy 21:20, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I thought that, among other things, the /subst template was supposed to add the text ":This review is transcluded from [[Talk:{{{1}}}]]. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review."

But it's not doing it (see, e.g., Talk:Thrombophilia/GA1 or any number of other recent GA pages). Are the instructions on where to find the transcluded page meant to be hidden from editors at the article? WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:51, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

That line doesn't appear on the review page as it would be redundant and inaccurate there: it only appears on the article talk page, e.g., Talk:Thrombophilia#GA Review. Geometry guy 21:39, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I was looking for it in the wrong place. Thanks for setting me straight.

Do you think that would that would be a good spot for a sentence about all editors being welcome? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:43, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Request for vote by the community

I would like to request the opinion of the community on whether another bot should be requested to assist in the activities of the current bot: User:GA bot. There has been a tremendous amount of new good article nomination and in my opinion there is a need for another helper around these parts. Don't get me wrong GA bot is doing a great job in it's current state however the growing number of article who are being nominated for GA status needs to be handled by two equally important bots. My proposal is that a new bot: User:SCGBot be created to help GA bot in the tasks it has been programmed to undertake. I also propose that the bot be encoded in the same code and code format as GA bot. If you would like to see a preview of the request page for the bot, please click here. Thanks you. Jessy _(talk) ^(contribs) • 00:33, April 1, 2011 (UTC)

I'm confused. Why exactly do we need a second bot? The current bot is handling the current load (and has handled it quite well through the last month, with increased activity from the reviewing drive), and AFAIK could handle a significantly increased load with no problem. There is, as far as I can tell, no need for a second bot. Dana boomer (talk) 00:41, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree. I'm not really seeing why a second bot is needed. GA bot seems to be doing a good job. —GFOLEY FOOL— 00:47, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

As I stated above I do think GA bot is doing a great job currently however to take the load off of GA bot and to act as a replacement just in case (God forbid) there is a problem or malfunction with GA bot there will be a backup to help. Jessy _(talk) ^(contribs) • 00:51, April 1, 2011 (UTC)

(ec) Bot redundancy is not unusual for urgent, real-time, high-importance tasks (AIVbots are an example - when they stop working, the AIV board becomes messy within minutes), or if the main bot is unstable. I have no idea how stable is the current bot, but this task doesn't seem to warrant a duplicate bot. Materialscientist (talk) 00:53, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

The current GA bot is doing a good enough job as far as I have seen, and I've dealt with around eight GAs. Reaper Eternal (talk | contribs | block) 00:59, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

What harm can an extra bot do? I suppose that the two may "get in each others way", if I may, which might lead to some bugs or conflicts between them (I don't know much about bots so forgive me if I am wrong). But really, will it be bad for there to be an extra bot? MobileSnail 02:07, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

I have no objections to keeping a backup of the code in case GA bot's owner leaves Wikipedia, but... This seems kind of like an excuse to own a bot, rather than a solution to an existing problem. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:33, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Bingo. Eagles 24/7 (C) 02:42, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

I can appreciate, and I would encourage, having a backup of the bot's code. I don't see a need for a second bot at the moment. If the nomination process ticks up in activity and overloads the bot, then we'll talk. Until then, this is a solution in search of a problem. Imzadi 1979 → 03:08, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Concur. While, as it happened at DYK last year, an absent owner when no one knows the code can be a mess after a MediaWiki upgrade, there's no pressing need for a second operational bot here. Courcelles 05:45, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Duplication should be avoided; bots can clash. No problem currently needs fixing. Speak to the bot owner if you want to offer to help with it. Source of the bot is available; I see no reason to worry for the future of it.  Chzz  ►  14:53, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

This looks like a solution looking for a problem. However, as we have had serious problems in the past with script and bot owners going AWOL in the past and taking their code with them, there is no harm in parking a copy of the code of the existing bot somewhere fo safe keeping. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:20, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Withdrawing nominations

Once upon a time, the GAN guidelines included explicit instructions on how to withdraw a nomination, but they were removed in this edit aimed at shortening the guidelines. The associated discussion did not mention withdrawing nominations, so perhaps a baby got thrown out with the bath water.

It remains common sense and folk knowledge among many reviewers that nominators can withdraw nominations, and the /FAQ reflects this to some extent, but perhaps it would be helpful to restore a couple of sentences to the guidelines. Views? Geometry guy 21:53, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, very much so. It is not clear enough to some reviewers. --Rschen7754 00:14, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

I concur with Geometry Guy. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:23, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I've made a proposed change, and also added a further mention to the FAQ. Geometry guy 17:55, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

This came up rather quickly, and I did not see this item, because I had been discussing a similiar topic here. I would propose the following langauge instead:

To withdraw a nomination before the review has begun, remove the {{GA nominee}} from the article talk page. If you wish to withdraw a nomination after the review has begun, get consensus of those participating in the review, and have the reviewer use the fail process to record the outcome of the review.

There are cases where a number of people are involved in a GA Review, and the withdrawal should be discussed because it is unfair to the group if the first nominator has the right to "pull the plug" on a review when other parties are willing to continue. In many cases, differences between a nominator and a reviewer can be resolved by getting a second opinion rather than starting the review process from scratch.

As a matter of policy, should we adopt a "cooling off" period before the withdrawn nomination can be renominated? Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 04:35, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

I don't have a very firm opinion on the proposed "cooling off" period, but when the reviewer is actually spouting nonsense (e.g., claiming non-existent criteria), it seems inappropriate.

I see no reason for the nom should have to "get consensus". The process requires a nom to support listing the article as GA. If that person is no longer willing to have his or her name associated with the listing, then that person has the right to withdraw the nomination. Perhaps more relevantly, the reviewer has no business insisting that an article be or remain nominated, so the consensus of "those participating in the review" is wrong as written. Something like "the editors at the article, specifically excluding the reviewer" might be acceptable, but I'm not convinced that we want anything like this at all. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:03, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

I would add that a basic principle of GA is that we don't (need to) legislate about every possibility, because reassessment is readily available. GA reviews do not always get it right the first time, or sometimes even the second: the aim is to get it right in the end. Geometry guy 20:35, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Can't most problems be resolved by a 2nd opinion? What about all of the other editors and the reviewer who have invested a lot of time into the review and may be just a short list of changes away from passing the article? Consensus is a good thing at Wikipedia. By the way, if you look carefully at the templates, including {{Article history}}, {{GA}}, and the review subpage, once the article passes, the nominator's name is not recorded, but the reviewer's name is listed. This is appropriate because the reviewer's reputation is on the line that the GA criteria have been met. Racepacket (talk) 03:29, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Those templates do not record the reviewers' names. They only record the date that the review was closed. If a nominator withdraws a nomination, and there are other editors interested in the article willing to renominate it, they can do so. Once again, we don't need to legislate for an eventuality that's already covered. Imzadi 1979 → 03:36, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Given the friction surrounding your nomination of U.S. Route 223 and the fact that you are still on about it four months later, I think that clear rules are needed to prevent misunderstandings. As things stand now. The nominator has the right to withdraw, the reviewer has the right to try to talk the nominator out of it, and the reviewer has the right to review the second nomination. Collusion between the nominator and his/her friend to do a second review is inconsistent with the rules. Even if the nominator misuses the USRD IRC to arrange for his friend to do the second review, the first reviewer has the right to participate with comments in that review. And the first reviewer has the right to start a GAR if the second reviewer does not apply the GA criteria. Each of those steps can be wrapped in high wikidrama because there will be debates and accusations as to what unclear rules should mean. We can do better by having clear rules. Most important we should set a tone of cooperation, so that a nominator should only nominate an article if he/she has a good faith belief that it meets the GA criteria at the time of the nomination and he/she is willing to cooperate with the reviewer in the review process. There should be nothing to be gained by withdrawing the nomination just to game the system. I understand that chemistry between individuals communicating online can get tricky, but every nominator should be willing to accept constructive criticism, grammatical corrections, a copyright review (including all image files), without taking it personally. Perhaps we should have two new essays - what to expect from a GA Review and how to handle a problem GA review. Racepacket (talk) 04:45, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Request for 2nd opinion about Nemertea

Looie496 and I have such different approaches that I would appreciate a 2nd opinion. Please comment at Talk:Nemertea/GA1#Philcha_asking_for_a_2nd_opinion. --Philcha (talk) 13:52, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

I would welcome a 2nd opinion (or third, or fourth). I was already considering asking for one myself. Looie496 (talk) 22:07, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Review needs deleting

Could someone please delete Talk:Juliette Binoche/GA1, accidentally satrted by the GA nominator. --BelovedFreak 17:25, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

 Done Nikkimaria (talk) 03:24, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Talk:University of the Philippines Los Baños/GA1

Can someone delete this as it appears to have been accidentally started by the nominator. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:40, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Sorted, thanks. Jezhotwells (talk) 21:02, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

One GA submission, one GA review

I think the backlog of GA requests-currently 183 pending or underway-and the resulting time delay may discourage people from submitting articles for GA review. It appears that the requirement that any one who submits an item to DYK also review an item is very successful. It seems perfectly reasonable that anyone who can get an article to GA status is qualified to review another article to see if it passes. I suggest we consider such a policy for GA articles. — btphelps ^{(talk) (contribs)} 20:45, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

That works in DYK because the rules are basically mechanic: size, date of expansion, no obvious problems... anyone can make a decent review, both a regular DYK reviewer and a random user nominating an article for the first time. GA requirements are a little higher, and if we do this, we would have many users promoting articles "on the fly", without checking, just to allow their own nomination MBelgrano (talk) 20:58, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Speaking personally it's very successful at discouraging any further DYK nominations. Not that I nominated all that many before the recent rule change, so no great loss admittedly. Forcing editors to do GA reviews (or FA reviews, the problem is just as acute there) isn't the solution. Thought needs to be given as to how reviewers might be encouraged to come forwards, not press-ganged. Why is reviewing such a thankless job, for instance? How might it be made more rewarding. And please, I don't want to hear anything about barn stars. Malleus Fatuorum 21:17, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure that "anyone who can get an article to GA status is qualified to review another article". Remember, not every article that gets nominated at GAN is any where near to meeting the guidelines. Also, some editors (including myself) don't feel confident enough to review until they've been through the process themselves a few times. And some people just don't like reviewing, which is fair enough. Why penalise them when they've just spent their own time improving an article? I agree with Malleus that it can be a thankless task, I'm not really sure how to address that. One area to perhaps improve is encouraging those who would like to help out but lack confidence. I've heard a few people say that they would review, but they don't want to mess it up. I've helped a couple of new reviewers, and I know others have. I think that can work quite well, but maybe we need to make it more obvious that that can happen. I know it says "You may also wish to consult a mentor" at the end of "How to review an article", but there's so much information on that page, it's easy for people to miss bits. --BelovedFreak 08:53, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, I don't think that GA creators necessarily make good reviewers and vice versa. No quota system will work either, it will just slow the whole process down even more. Currently the oldest unreviewed nominations are about 30 days old, which is not bad. I think that a slightly more formal system of mentoring may be the only way forward. Jezhotwells (talk) 12:33, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

I have only just started reviewing, but probably would have jumped in sooner had there been an accessible mentoring process. I said as much toWAID after I asked her to check on my first review. It doesn't need to be at the level of providing second opinions on articles, but enough to make sure the criteria is interpreted correctly and if things get a little heated there is someone experienced that can help calm things down. AIRcorn (talk) 12:43, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Which reminds me: The page on GA mentors is at WP:GAN/M, for anyone who is interested in looking at it. (I hope that your discussion about improvements to Stade Roland Garros is still going well.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:13, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Pretty quite at the moment, will have to ping the editor again soon. Thanks for the link. AIRcorn (talk) 08:24, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

I started reviewing after getting (?) 4 articles promoted to GA. Then I realised that, if everyone did this, the load on GAN would be unsustainable - so I reviewed on a 1-for-1 basis. It's just analysing the criteria, using commonsense and being ready to discuss, and hard work - especially checking refs, as many articles say a few things that actually not what the sources say. As a result, I've got a few Barnstars for reviewing. A few editors have GAs by the bucket loads but (also) never review, and I avoid their nominations. --Philcha (talk) 14:11, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

I started reviewing after getting 4 articles promoted as well. I would propose that like DYK, you get 5 GAs approved for free. But before you submit your sixth GA, you take a simple online examination. The exam asks you a set of 10 questions selected at random from a panel of 25 possible questions about the GA criteria. This would force reviewers to take the time to actually read the criteria. Once you pass the test, you get to display a fancy "certified GA reviewer" ribbon on your user page, and you go ahead and review away. We would probably need to establish a "problem/help desk" to handle any complaints about mis-calibrated GA reviewers. I believe there are about 1 million articles on English Wikipedia that already meet the GA criteria, but that we are lacking the reviewers needed to evaluate them. Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 07:52, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Might I ask who is going to administer all of this, set the "simple examination", mark the answers, deal with appeals form those who fail, etc.? Jezhotwells (talk) 09:10, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

How about this: How about we create a special subpage for whingeing about the backlog? We could put up two notes at the top, that provide basic information:

1. People have been talking about the supposedly huge backlog literally since weeks after GA was created.
2. The average backlog in 2010 was 330 articles. At the moment, for comparison, it's currently 164 (yes, half that. Last month's backlog reduction drive was quite effective).

We could even have a bot fully protect the page whenever {{GAN counter|Wait}} is less than the previous year's average.

Seriously, I appreciate the fact that people are cognizant of the need for reviewers, but we actually don't have a big problem right now. If you're concerned, then step up and review one extra article. That's really all it will take—a handful of people doing slightly more than they are now. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:20, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

To respond to Jezhotwells, there is a lot of "distance learning" software that can take a panel of questions, select a random sample from the preloaded questions, present the sample to the user and automatically grade them. The policy question becomes whether you want to create a new bit in the signon record to reflect the people who have passed the exam, or just put a category on their user page. I am proposing a system that would involve no administrative tasks other than writing the 25 questions and developing the interface to send the test results back to the record of the users. My motive is that it is clear to me that many reviewers either have never read the GA criteria or have forgotten them. In the United States, people must take an automated test to demonstrate knowledge of driving laws, every six years, no matter how long they have held a license. If GAN exists six years from now, I would not object to demand people to be retested to show that they have not forgot the criteria.

There are two big benefits to the reviewer/testing requirements. First, people who review get a valuable perspective that helps them do a better job of preparing articles for GA nomination. Second, because anyone who nominates more than 5 articles would have to take the test to become a "certified GA reviewer", it guarantees that the nominators also have read and understood the GA criteria, also resulting in better prepared nominations. Racepacket (talk) 23:22, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

That is a pretty brutal case of instruction creep there. I'm with Malleus on this one. Forcing a quid pro quo system will certainly reduce the number of articles awaiting reviews, but mostly because it will reduce the number of nominatons. Resolute 23:52, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Your criticism has merit, Reso. It still leaves open the question of how to get more reviews performed and how to get the reviewers to read and understand the GA criteria. Could you ask each WikiProject to designate at least one reviewer? Could you advertise more at various community pages? I believe that if the waiting time for a reviewer were one week or less, the number of nominations who increase dramatically. Racepacket (talk) 10:45, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Side comment: Your claims about the US requirements for drivers' licenses deserves a {{failed verification}} tag. I've never even heard of a state that has such a requirement. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:25, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Request for second opinion on blotchy swell shark

I and my reviewer, User:Philcha, disagree regarding the structure of Blotchy swell shark#Description; the comments relevant to the dispute are here. Please leave your comments on the review page. -- Yzx (talk) 22:58, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

I have responded, and as always would be happy if someone else did as well. It's just a matter of reading the linked section of the article, and deciding whether the facts are presented in an acceptable, non-confusing order. You don't need to be an expert on marine biology to have an opinion on this point. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:29, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

I too have left an opinion. Jezhotwells (talk) 18:51, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

GA review: Legacy of Leonid Brezhnev

The reviewer who was going to review my GA has been block indefinitly, can some other take over his reviewer duties on this article? If so thanks! :) --TIAYN (talk) 06:10, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

This article has now been passed, but the review, the second by Wikipedian2, is to say the least somewhat superficial. Jezhotwells (talk) 23:33, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Nick Loren

Somneone has nominated the article Nick Loren for GA under theatre and film. The images are obviously suspect.. the fansite refs and the layout.Rain the 1 ^BAM 03:32, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

I have just quickfailed it. Jezhotwells (talk) 12:33, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Gery Chico/GA2

I would appreciate a second opinion. The article has been nominated by and editor who has disclosed that they worked on Chico's campaign to become Mayor of Chicago. This appears to be a major conflict of interest, but it looks as if most self serving material has been removed. Nevertheless, I am somewhat uncomfortable with this situation. Jezhotwells (talk) 18:45, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Disagree. If the editor/nominator has nominated, though has not contributed to the article, there should be no problem. If the nominator also wrote the article, but remained impartial, then I simply see an editor with an "inside" view and firsthand knowledge of the topic. It is up to the reviewer to judge if the editor has been impartial, if the references are reliable secondary sources, or if the editor has inserted his own opinions (which would then be "original research"). If these points can be satisfactorily resolved, then I would consider the nominator an "expert in the field", which is exactly who should be writing articles. Boneyard90 (talk) 21:10, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

What's there to disagree with? Jezhotwells asking for a second opinion? If you look at the nominator's history, they seem to be a single-purpose account, only having ever worked on this particular article -- to which they have previously admitted to having a vested interest. As the reviewer, Jezhotwells is asking for someone to help look into a potential WP:COI matter. IMO, this is a productive use of the second opinion feature. If I knew anything about the subject matter, I would volunteer to help. María (habla conmigo) 21:54, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

To clarify: I disagree with the statement: "This appears to be a major conflict of interest". Boneyard90 (talk) 22:07, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

In response to Maria, I could do with someone with knowledge of the political scene in Chicago. I shall ask at the Chicago project. In response to Boneyard, the WP:COI policy suggests that people with close affiliations to an article's subject should refrain from editing that article. Jezhotwells (talk) 23:28, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Well, the editor openly declared his position and the tone of the article is pretty neutral. I would say there would be a COI if the mayoral campaign was underway, that is, before the election. But since the election is over, it would seem the contributor has nothing to promote. I understand the issue is moot at this point, but thought I would throw out my opinion anyway. Boneyard90 (talk) 19:06, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Boneyard90. I am waiting to see if there is any response from the Chicago project. Jezhotwells (talk) 22:06, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

This article is now at GAR. See Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Gery Chico/1 Geread (talk) 16:22, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Reviews for Tony Blair and C. W. A. Scott

My computer is on the blink and I don't have much time on my hands atm. Would anyone else be willing to try and tie up my open reviews for Tony Blair and C. W. A. Scott? Thanks, and sorry to burden whoever takes them on. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 23:56, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

I have picked up C. W. A. Scott. Jezhotwells (talk) 19:27, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Now reviewing Tony Blair. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:45, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Both of these articles needed considerable work and have thus been failed. Jezhotwells (talk) 20:32, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Request for 2nd opinion about Nemertea - still open

Looie496 and I have such different approaches that I would appreciate a 2nd opinion. Please comment at Talk:Nemertea/GA1#Philcha_asking_for_a_2nd_opinion. --Philcha (talk) 13:52, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

I would welcome a 2nd opinion (or third, or fourth). I was already considering asking for one myself. Looie496 (talk) 22:07, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

The original was archived, so I've repeated it. --Philcha (talk) 07:57, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Proposed retargeting of WP:GAC

FYI: It has been proposed that "WP:GAC" be retargeted to Wikipedia:Good article criteria. Feel free to contribute to the discussion. Thanks! Swarm ^X 18:08, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Nemertea again

I think Looie496's review at Talk:Nemertea/GA1 was inadequate because it did not cover their anatomy and physiology, which are very strange even for invertebrates. The review mainly concentrated on the lead, which IMO is the wrong way round, as the lead should summarise the main text and hence the main text should be reviewed first. I don't understand Looie496's comment "Without topic sentences I can't tell what the paragraphs are intended to be about, so there is no way for me to evaluate the adequacy of their content", as I think I understand what the sources say about these animals. The sources don't give the topic sentences that Looie496 likes - journal articles are written for other experts, and good general zoology books begrudge space for "minor phyla" (e.g. most phyla); and without support from sources, IMO topic sentences would be editorialism and forbidden by WP:V. So I've used the template to start Talk:Nemertea/GA2 --Philcha (talk) 22:24, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

GA rating on Commander United Kingdom Maritime Forces

Has there been a formal GAN on this page: [[Commander United Kingdom Maritime Forces]? I can't see one, but yet it seems that it has been promoted anyway with this edit: [8]. Is this correct? Has there been a change in policy? 124.185.236.32 (talk) 01:33, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

 Fixed I re-reassessed the page. There's no evidence of a GAN. Tbhotch* ^{۩ ۞} 01:37, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for the quick response. 124.185.236.32 (talk) 01:48, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Review for Santorum (neologism)

Santorum (neologism)

I have recently added a bit of sourced info to this article, and nominated it for GA candidacy. I chipped in to the review process, and I am currently reviewing another article from the topic. ;) I was wondering if we could get a GA Reviewer who would be willing to help out with an expedited review process for Santorum (neologism)? I am dealing with some ongoing personal life issues, and it would really be a favor and help me out.

Thank you for your time, -- Cirt (talk) 16:07, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Concern about passed article

Hi ya'll - I noticed that Azerbaijan was within the past few hours passed as a GA. I did a PR on this article a few days ago and found numerous problems, so I was surprised to see it passed as a GA so quickly. When I clicked on the talk page, I found a very cursory review and many of the problems that I had found still existing in the article. These include over a dozen dead links (shown here), over half a dozen sources that even on a cursory examination look unreliable, others that don't have enough information to show what they are, unsourced statistics, etc. My PR can be found at Wikipedia:Peer review/Azerbaijan/archive2, and many of the comments are still valid, although some are more focused on the FA criteria. Does someone have the time to talk with the nominator and reviewer on this, and perhaps take it through a GAR if necessary? I don't have the time this weekend, or I would do it myself... Dana boomer (talk) 11:34, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Should we not be concerned, particularly when it comes to music?

I don't know if people have noticed or not, put there is a particularly high number of articles in the Music section (75), some being there since March 2011. Should we be concerned? — Lil_℧niquℇ №1 ^[talk] 01:36, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Agree, however, this is a good thing that there's a lot of nominated articles. On the contrary, the number of reviewers seems to be dwindling in numbers. I would review articles, just don't have good prose to do so, AJona1992 (talk) 02:13, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Can you do the rest of it? You can always ask someone else to check over the grammar and such for you.

Compared to last year's average, we have about 15% more articles nominated than normal, and 20% more waiting for a reviewer, which is a bit worrisome. In particular, the music list recently has been running closer to 50 articles, and is now a time and a half that, which could account for half of the excess backlog. I've left at note at WT:WikiProject Music to encourage a few new people to try reviewing an article. It would be good to have a few new folks involved. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:34, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Well I can try to do review articles again, since I've looked over what others did. But if anything, I'll just try my best and ask for further assistance, if you would like to be the one I go to, that'll work perfectly. Its all up to you, though, AJona1992 (talk) 21:30, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

You can always ask me for help. I suggest picking an article that you think is highly likely to pass, since I personally think it's more fun to review a likely winner, and it's usually easier. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:35, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Just finished reviewing this article, if there is any mistakes I'll address them :) AJona1992 (talk) 00:47, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I've taken up several articles (mainly because I've nominated three myself) but I didn't want the editors of the articles I've agreed to review to automatically review my nominated articles as this might appear that then there is some reviewing bias. I was going so suggest... maybe we should do a quick acid test with the criteria and see if any could be eliminated straight away? — Lil_℧niquℇ №1 ^[talk] 17:40, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I don't think we should eliminate articles, if they do not meet the criteria, like that. Maybe if we spot several mistakes in grammar, prose, choice of words or if some sections are unreferenced then we should point those out. At least review them and give out helpful tips to better the article, and also peer reviews should also be mentioned as a secondary choice for reviews. They review articles in less than a month. If they go there first then here, it can help out the backlog. AJona1992 (talk) 18:48, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Dangerously low on reviewers

In the past month, we had a net increase of 120 articles in the backlog. Meanwhile, it does feel like there are fewer reviewers these days, as I only see the same handful handling all the articles. Honestly though, I'm entirely out of ideas on how to find people to tackle the backlog, and I don't have the desire to review multiple articles a day anymore. Anyone have any ideas? Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 04:32, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

There are still 32 participants left in the WikiCup. We could post a message on their talk pages encouraging them to review. Nanobear (talk) 04:37, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm a FAC, FAR, MILHIST peer review, and MILHIST-A reviewer. I find GA hard because it is difficult to find easy opposes, and I approach it as an article improvement process rather than a pass-fail, and am use to a collaborative reviewing environment. (Sadly, that doesn't seem very helpful, given GA works very differently). Fifelfoo (talk) 04:43, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

As for me personally, the reason I do not review more nominations than I do now is that I'm scared of reviewing topics I know little about. I especially do not have enough time to look for off-line sources, so I usually decline to review articles with too many of them. Perhaps if the GA review rules gave explicit permission for reviewers to assume good faith on off-line sources, there would be more reviews. I don't know if that's a good idea, but it's something to think about. Nanobear (talk) 05:31, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Reviewing does tend to fall drastically after a backlog elimination drive, as people tend to burn themselves out during that month. Arsenikk ^(talk) 09:03, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

I think the drive the previous month may have something to do with it. I reviewed no articles last month purely because I felt a bit burnt out from the drive. I've had a nice break from reviewing, concentrating on other stuff, and plan to get back into reviewing this month. The same may be true for others. --BelovedFreak 09:57, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Agree with much of above, also getting fed up of semi-literate nominators in the music, TV show and sports fields who just cannot recognise that they do not have the skills to write good plain English and resist attempts to point them in the direction of getting copy-edits done before nominating. See User talk:Jezhotwells/Archive 7#Your review of Rainbow for an example of the response on pointing out how poor the prose was. Some users appear to use boiler plate for every song by an artist and then just change a few minor details. Even scarier, some of them actually undertake reviews themselves. I think one way of sorting this out would be to make crystal clear that poorly written articles will be quick-failed and should not be renominated until a third party has turned them into "reasonably good prose". One problem of course is that anyone can sign up to the WP:Guild of copyeditors even if they have no English writing skills. Jezhotwells (talk) 10:24, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Actually, I agree with this too. I have long been reluctant to review nominations from some editors, particularly in the music and theatre/film/drama sections, because of sub standard articles coupled with a particularly unreceptive, sometimes bordering on rude, attitude. Unfortunately, many of these nominations are the ones clogging up the page. The fact that they are reviewing each other's noms is even worse. Don't get me wrong, this is certainly not a problem with all of the music nominators and I have no problem with nominators questioning statements made by the reviewer. To be honest though, reading those comments on your talkpage make me even less inclined to take up certain reviews.--BelovedFreak 10:40, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm guilty of ignoring the music section myself for the reasons already mentioned. I'm hoping it is just burnout from the backlog drive and not something that continues. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 02:58, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

I cherry pick a bit. I don't like reviewing articles I think there is a good chance I would have to fail. I check out nominator history as well as the article before starting a review. Sometimes there is just nothing that catches my eye. Canada Hky (talk) 03:35, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

I have to admit there are two types of nominations I tend to prefer: clear-cut failures (whether quick or not), and easy nominations where the prose is good and only small issues need to be looked into. One area that is often avoided are articles which are clearly below standards, but still not a fail. Often these have portions lacking references, and have a below-standard prose. A lot of feedback is needed to bring them up to standards. There seems to have developed a culture that the threshold to fail an article is quite high, leaving many such articles unreviewed. If they are failed, the nominator often complains that they were not granted an "on hold" time and a very extensive review (of course, some people also complain because the review is too extensive). To take a current example with Lhasa: the article as it stands now is short of the standards, with sections with single-sentence prose, lacking references, overuse of images and bare references; perhaps it is better to make a fairly rough review, fail it, let the nominator work with the issues, and then bring it up later? Arsenikk ^(talk) 21:48, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

You touch on an interesting point. It's obviously easier to review a quick fail or an article nominated by someone with a solid history of producing good articles. The ones that take the time, and often a disproportionate amount of it, are the overwhelming majority in the middle. I'm as guilty as anyone of a tendency to cherry pick, but as this project is manned by volunteers I don't see any way around that. Certainly barnstars won't cut it. Malleus Fatuorum 00:14, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

The number of articles waiting for a reviewer is still slightly less than the average for 2010. I therefore don't see any particular reason to worry. In addition to the typical post-drive lull, I think some of us are losing time to the Racepacket ArbCom case that might otherwise have been spent on GA reviews. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:18, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps posting notices on wikiprojects? I know many are dead, by our WP:POLAND is quite live, and it is not impossible that some of our members (or myself) would be motivated to review a Poland-related GA if you notify us of it on our talk page. Now, we have Article Alerts, but bot notification is not as personal nor urgent as a talk page note would be. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 23:21, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

What is the chance that something drastic might be proposed...such as changing GA review to a simple pass fail process with a supplied check list. Once listed...OK....if unlisted full listing of the reasons is given and it can relist once list is accomplished and repeat.--Amadscientist (talk) 13:03, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't like that idea. The idea is for article improvement and the method suggested sounds antithetical to collaborative editing. Many articles will have a few things here and there worth improving, that it might be mean to fail on, but are clear and easy improvements. Agree about the lack of reviewers being a problem. Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:14, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I understand that. That is why I would consider a change like that to be drastic. However it is clear the main problem of lack of reviewers is the process itself. If it's not the 7 day struggle of attempting to help a combative editor used to rubber stamp listing or having to be accused of being difficult or of quick declining even when a full list is there from the reviewer. No, I know many may not like that idea....and I can understand but, simply put, it's all a matter of continuing to not address the problem one way or another. Why can't we be bold in attempting to deal with the problem...and I mean, the problem of fewer and fewer reviews and reviewers with some creativity? OK....so yes....going with what the process is right now, WHAT COULD we do to streamline the process to ATTRACT more reviewers, get the reviewers who have walked away to come back and even work to improving the work of those who are still there. Why not create a "Reviewer" package with the small thing that help a review. Yes, maybe an actual check list. I use check lists. Why should the reviewer have to write a review LONGER than the article? Sometimes it's simply a matter of leaving detailed comments per MOS and the already existing guidelines of what a good article is per Wikipedia:Good article criteria along with list of things found on Wikipedia:Guide for nominating good articles. Personally I think the two need to be combined into a single article or at least stress more about the later because to me many editors refuse to understand that even images are checked.

Anyway I am not one to do the same thing over and over getting the same results. I also don't like the idea that I must take 7 days on a review. If the review has to go on hold and you expect editors to organize their own efforts to remember these multiple holds and still continue to review further....when will we have time for our own work? All I am saying is we need help. So...I am going to do what I can for myself to make it easier for me...and if anything I come up with works well maybe it will catch on more and eventually encourage more reviews in that way. Thanks.--Amadscientist (talk) 00:27, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

After I posted on WT:POLAND, following my idea above, an editor has volunteered to review most Polish-related GAs (see here). Has anybody asked for help at any other WikiProjects? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:17, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

OK, no....and I had thought of it as well and saw your post. I will do so now.--Amadscientist (talk) 02:19, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

GAN nominator

In the FAC page states:Nominators who are not significant contributors to the article should consult regular editors of the article prior to a nomination. is there something similar in the GAN? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Stone (talk • contribs) 19:39 30 May 2011 (UTC)

No, there isn't, although it would obviously be prudent to do so. Malleus Fatuorum 20:16, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks; I experienced it with several of my precious chemical elements. Is it possible to get it into the guidelines for GAN? --Stone (talk) 21:28, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Why?

If the article meets the criteria (even if only barely), then it should be listed. If it doesn't, then the reviewer is supposed to notice this and not list it. Any editor at the article can encourage that "noticing" step by pointing out its limitations. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:32, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

But of course exactly the same argument applies to FAC, where such a rule has been in place for some considerable time. The idea is that nominators should be able to respond to and deal with any concerns raised by the reviewer; if they can't, then they're just wasting the reviewer's time. Stone, if you'd like to propose an addition to the GA nomination process then here's the right place to do it, and see what support there is for it. I'd be inclined to support your idea myself. Malleus Fatuorum 01:09, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

That's one of the many differences between GA and FAC. The nominator is basically a nobody from GAN's perspective. The participation of the nom is absolutely not required by GAN. You don't get "credit" for nomming an article, you don't have to have any previous connection to the article, you're not required to watch the review, or anything else. The sole "duty" of the nom is to say, "Hey, I think that this probably meets the criteria, so somebody should look it over." The sole "right" that the nom has in the process is to withdraw the nomination (that is, to say "Oops, I shouldn't have nommed this, because on further reflection, I've decided that it doesn't actually meet the criteria").

Adding "procedural" rules like this is not appropriate for the lightweight, anti-bureaucratic, flexible process that GA benefits from. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:53, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Have you ever seen a GA review? Here's an example of a recent one. The nominator is expected to be able to deal with any issues that come to light; it's not a "yes it meets the criteria" or "no it doesn't meet the criteria" decision. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Malleus Fatuorum (talk • contribs) 18:02, 07 June 2011 (UTC)

Anyone can address the issues, though the nom is generally expected to, whether they are the prime writer or a drive-by. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 18:29, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

But how many editors other than the nominator and the reviewer are likely to be aware of the review? I find WhatamIdoing's description of the GA nomination process to be contrary to all common sense and current practice. I also find the notion that there's no credit for a GA nomination to be rather strange as well, given that there's no credit for anything around here, and certainly none for the reviewers. Malleus Fatuorum 18:35, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

If the regular editors at an article somehow don't notice the GA tag or the transclusion of the review onto the article's talk page, then IMO they're not actually "regular editors of the article" in the sense of "paying the smallest bit of attention to the article".

I agree that most noms are made by the main editor of an article, and that most of the nominated articles only have one main editor. I consider that to be a sign of how poorly Wikipedians collaborate, i.e., that it's easier for me to take an article to GA-quality by myself than to work with other people, whose views on how to structure, focus, source, and copyedit the article might not perfectly agree with mine. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:51, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Have I ever seen a GA review? Many dozens, possibly hundreds.

I've also seen the FAQ, which I'd recommend to you:

Is the "nominator" a special position?

No. Anyone may nominate any article, including unregistered users and people who have never edited the article. Nominating an article is not the exclusive privilege of an article's primary authors. Nominators have no special privileges over other editors, except that they can withdraw the nomination. Everyone interested in an article is encouraged to participate in the review, not just the person who happened to nominate it.

Should nominators respond to reviewers' concerns? And what should reviewers do if they don't?

All editors at the nominated article are encouraged, but not required, to respond to reviewers' concerns, not just the nominator. If they don't, they should not be surprised if the article is not listed. "Drive-by" nominations (nominations by editors who do not normally edit that article and may not be watching it) are permitted and are one source of non-responsiveness. If the article does not meet the six criteria, then reviewers normally wait a reasonable amount of time between explaining the specific areas requiring improvement and failing the nomination.

It is typical for noms to be the primary editor of an article, and it is typical for noms to negotiate changes to make the reviewer pass it (and it is typical for them to be unhappy if it fails, especially if they don't understand why it failed, or if it failed because the reviewer was making up non-existent criteria), but the nom is not, and has never been, required, or necessarily even encouraged, to do anything other than nominate the article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:46, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd recommend to you that you extract your head from your arse and stop trying to waste GA reviewer's time with this nonsense. Malleus Fatuorum 19:53, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Have in mind Wikipedia:Four Award, a recognition that may be lost if the article is nominated by some passing-by nominator. Besides, the editor may intend to nominate the article but not now, but after achiving a certain number of expansions and improvements, a passing-by nominator that simply "thinks" the article is ready would create an unnecesary dispute. Or the editor may have limited editing time right now (for off-internet concerns, for example), and may delay nominations or other community-related issues until having such time Cambalachero (talk) 01:28, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Follow up

I've been informed on my talk page that quoting the FAQ above (rather than agreeing with Malleus' opinion) is "off topic", "patronizing", "wasting editors' time", "misbehaving", and "trolling". Malleus' response, i.e., "I'd recommend to you that you extract your head from your arse ", is deemed merely "unhelpful", rather than an appalling act of rudeness by an editor who has an unquestionable reputation for rudeness. If other editors agree with this surprising (to me) assessment, I'd like to know this. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:17, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Request for reviewers for educational assignments GANs

In the past WP:SUP and GAN have successfully collaborated on teaching students how to write Good Articles (past example with link to older ones). Basically, a new bunch of educational assignment projects will soon be nominated for GAN. Full list of 3 articles that are subject to this assignment can be below (and details of the assignment are here). As before, those GANs are a bit more urgent then others (as many students, unlike your average editor, will be much less motivated to address the reviewers comments and fix the articles after they receive their grade). For this educational assignment, nominations will take place on 6 June, and grading is expected on 20 June. I am well aware of our backlog problems, and while I have no problem with my own GANs waiting for a reviewer for many weeks (and sometimes, months), in this case I'd appreciate if some reviewers would volunteer to review those articles outside of our chronological queue, with reviews appearing hopefully around 7-9 June. Below is the list of the articles in this batch, they all should be nominated by students today. If a reviewer would like to take care of a given article, please strike it out and sign below. If you are interested in learning more about Wikimedia Foundation educational initiatives, check out Wikipedia:Ambassadors page. Thanks! --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 23:18, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Group 1: Economic globalization (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 2: Archaic globalization (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 3: Social web (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

I'll take archaic globalization, although at this point it looks like it needs a good bit of work before it's anywhere near GA-ready. Dana boomer (talk) 18:43, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Any takers for the remaining two? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:26, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

I would, but I'm not really one who takes ones that are a good ways away and moves them up to GA; I prefer working with the ones just about there already. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:19, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Likewise, these appear to be a long way from GA standard, more like essays. Jezhotwells (talk) 18:39, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

You are allowed to be critical :) About 40% of student articles passes GA; failure is hardly rare. A major part of the assignment is students trying to respond to your comments and address them; this is a great way for them to learn how Wikipedia works. But yes, the average quality of articles that have to be reviewed is lower than what we are used to - but, as I mentioned, 40% of them nonetheless make enough of a progress to reach GA :) I understand this may not appeal to all, of course, but I hope that just like in the past some reviewers will enjoy this challenge... :) --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 20:51, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

The call for volunteers for this has been put out in this week's Signpost N&N section. Hope you find someone; unfortunately I'm not keen to take this on due to lack of subject knowledge.(Worst case scenario, you might consider creating an evil student-reviewing sockpuppet? ;-) Although that would rather spoil the point of editing an article "in the wild"! Great choices of article btw - nice to find something that clearly deserves an article, of manageable length, without someone else having got there first!) TheGrappler (talk) 02:08, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the update; I need to thank somebody at the Signpost. At this point, only one article needs a reviewer. I'll try to repay the favor and review something myself :) --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:59, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

For clarification, the "somebody at the Signpost" who put that in, was me! TheGrappler (talk) 22:04, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! Sadly, we are still short one reviewer. The students are starting to ask me where is the review, and I have a bad feeling I'll have to tell them on Monday that they may not be getting reviews other than from me :( This may not encourage them to edit further, I am afraid... --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 01:18, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Also, to return the help of the reviewers, and help with the backlog, I will review an article for each review started (for my students' articles). So far, for the two reviews begun above, I've begun the Talk:Political abuse of psychiatry in the Soviet Union/GA1 and Talk:Social identity/GA1. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 03:08, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I went ahead and started the third one, albeit reluctantly since it will be a direct break from my review style. I'll do the best I can. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 21:40, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Wrong section

I note that Keller Fountain Park is listed under Geography but should probably be "Sports and recreation" and that Karachi is also listed there but should really be under "Places". I am reluctant to move them as I don't see any protocol for this and in any case I have a mild COI as I have an article up for review behind them in the queue. Ben MacDui 07:57, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Karachi has now been put in the places section, but Keller Fountain Park appears to be in the correct section as an urban or historical site and is currently under review. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:40, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

== Quick Decline GA2 No comments or review made. ==

I re-listed The Rocky Horror Picture Show and made all the changes per talk page from the de-listing but User:Queenieacoustic quick failed it with no comments just a list of references the comment: "Please add to the list references that can be used for the film article". Am I wasting my time with my reviews by actualyl starting that darn pesky Review Page?? Can they really quick decline the article without reason? Cause if that's all I gotta do....I could clear your backlog in about 4 hrs.--Amadscientist (talk) 12:00, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I found Talk:The Rocky Horror Picture Show/GA2 But I see no reason that quick decline should have been made. If this is correct...however.... Woohoo. I'm gonna get a lot down.--Amadscientist (talk) 12:18, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

User admits he could have held but didn't think it could be corrected in 7 days. Review did not show up on the talk page[9] and is still not there. Are the bots misbehaving? Article has simply been re-listed and an invitation to the original reviewer to return if they are interested in continuing.--Amadscientist (talk) 13:58, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Article has simply been removed from nomination for now. It's barely a C article at the moment after much trimming of unreliable sources, claims, fan sites, etc.--Amadscientist (talk) 00:11, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

I had something similar happen once on a quick fail. I wonder if the bot knows how to cope if the template marked as failed before it notices that the review page was created. In this instance, those two actions happened within three minutes of each other (time spent writing up all the details before the first 'save page' is invisible to the system). WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:38, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Biology and Medicine noms deriving from university assignment

I want to bring up a point concerning several current noms in this category. The articles Neurolaw, Hyperkinesia (neurology), Satellite glial cell, KC (patient), and Cushing reflex were all expanded as part of a university educational assignment in the Spring, and part of the assignment was that the students would receive additional credit if their articles reached GA status. However, the class ended over a month ago, and it is unlikely that we will ever see any of the nominators again.

I have to admit that I signed up to review Neurolaw and then dropped the ball on it, partly due to discouragement at the conflict of interest I knew to be present in the nomination. However this one in particular may be different from the others, in that there are editors who were not part of the class who have shown some interest in it. For the others, though, I think there is minimal chance that a GA review will go anywhere. I am wondering whether it would be better to simply let them fail one by one, or to be proactive in some way. Looie496 (talk) 23:59, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

We have several options: The simplest thing to do is to process them as usual; there's no rule that says the nom has to even be alive, much less participate in the review. We could contact the noms and see whether they're still interested: if they respond and if they say that they're not, then we could withdraw the nominations. Alternatively, we could process them with the assumption that there are no interested editors at the article, and therefore with a bias towards failing it if there are any problems at all, rather than hoping someone will fix up any perceived problems.

My initial inclination is to process them as usual, but I don't feel strongly about it.

BTW, Wizardman offered to deal with the Neurolaw nomination for you, but if you've got a decision on it, it might save him some trouble if you officially listed or failed it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:45, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

The best course for these would be to start with a skim review; if any obvious issues are found then those can be failed. After that a review could be done, with a pass/fail (not a hold) being the result. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:51, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

This is something I am going to be doing for all my projects. Skimming through all nominations to see what are obvious quick declines and see if any also fail for the less obvious reasons of image and copyright. Many articles have some horrible issues with overuse of Fair Use imagery, no rational or only boilerplate info with no proper rational....and tons with missing information. If the article has only a few it wouldn't be something to decline on that basis, but articles such as Stanley Kubrick have so many issues with just the images I just reviewed that alone and declined. There is no way they can fix those in 7 days without just deeleting and there is already a debate on review for non free content and many more about to be or speedy deleted. It is my belief that many articles are simply being nominated without proper peer review of other editors before the main contributer nominates it.--Amadscientist (talk) 04:59, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

I briefly looked over a couple of them. The hyperkinesia page, while it's not a simple pass (e.g., IMO the lead ought to be several paragraphs rather than one long one), looks like it might not be too far from passing, and there's at least one experienced editor active in the article right now. KC needs a bit more work, with (e.g.) paragraphs that contain statistics but not sources. The Cushing article now has a proposed merge, but the material to be merged in is just eight sentences, some of which is redundant to material already in the article. So while I might be slow to pick it up (so that the proposed merge could be settled one way or the other), the proposal is not an actual barrier to a review.

In general, the students focused on top-quality sources, which is commendable, and most of the textbooks are free online, which is convenient for reviewers. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:26, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

I am willing to review Satellite glial cell and have left a note at the nominators talk page for what it's worth. I also took the step of leaving messages at WP:MEDS and WP:BIO asking for volunteers in case the students have indeed left. AIRcorn (talk) 06:29, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

article vs. talk space

What is the meaning of Category:Wikipedia good articles in talk space and Category:Good articles in article space? Where does the official GA count come from?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 23:32, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

It's a little complicated. One count is available through {{GA number}}, and that one is based on Category:GA-Class Good articles. That category is used by the V1.0 bot for tracking changes to the category, but it should in most cases be equivalent to the talk page category listed above, since as far as I know the main templates that generate them ({{ArticleHistory}} and {{GA}}) generate both categories together. Differences happen if someone adds one category manually. The article-space category is generated by the template that produces the GA icon ({{Good article}}), and some editors get a count from that category with the pagesincategory keyword. There is also a count of the articles actually listed on the WP:GA pages; this count is used at WP:GAS in part because category counts (and tranclusion counts) have some difficulties for recordkeeping. They must be observed and recorded because they change dynamically. Categories can be added manually to any page. Here, specifically, some editors use the icon template on their user or user talk pages, though the template now only generates the category in article space. Still, the icon template can be inappropriately added to an article that isn't GA, though inapproriate uses in article space get removed periodically. (The icon templates may also be removed from a GA (or FA) through regular editing; they are not "required".) Finally, due to server processing lags, categories may not include every recent addition or removal. FA is analogous, except that there is only one talk page category, and the count is kept by hand rather than generated by pagesincategory. Gimmetoo (talk) 00:17, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Shopping for GA?

It appears that User:Racepacket is shopping for GA.[10] I may be wrong but, if anything, he is being a bit of a problem in that his behavior is making reviewers uncomfortable.[11]--Amadscientist (talk) 23:58, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

I am not "shopping for a GA." You reviewed "Getty Villa" and failed it in March on grounds that I could not see. So, I renominated it and Daniel Christensen reviewed it and passed it also in March. In the course of the review, he expressed disagreement with some of your conclusions (without any prompting from me.) Now, on June 13, you added comments to the end of his review, and started a GA Reassessment without giving any notice to either of us. I discovered your reassessment and left a note on his talk page to alert him as well. I think that your reading of the sources and understanding of the facts are different than mine, and I am surprised that you find the article to be "inaccurate."

Having already conducted a prior GA review of Getty Villa, it would have been better for you to start a Community Reassessment rather than an Individual Reassessment of the article.

All of this came to light after you started reviewing Talk:Getty Foundation/GA1 today. You asked why there were square brackets in the quotes, and I explained that they show where I changed the quotes. You then asked why I changed the quotes and I explained to make the sentence grammatical. I offered to work with you to meet any concerns that you have in order to resolve the review, which you interpreted as somehow "pressing you." I did not intend to pressure you and I assume that you are raising questions and concern in good faith.

I have always thought of GA Reviews as a learning experience for both the reviewer and the nominator. The Getty Foundation article has been awaiting review since April 30, so I was pleased that you volunteered to review it. My desire to interact with you was genuine and not an act of hostility. Thank you for your efforts on GAs. Racepacket (talk) 01:40, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately your interpretation of things is off considerably. First, a complete and detailed review was made with full notes on the first review you are referring to.[12] You simply argued almost all of them. I fail to see what you learned in that experience accept that perhaps if you don't get the outcome you want, you will simply keep nominating the same, nearly unaltered article. Second, the reassessment made by the next "reviewer" failed to follow nearly all proper procedure by not creating a review page, by not actually reviewing the article and summarily dismissing the prior review as a "conflict between editors" that simply did not exist.[13] Whatever issues you may have on Wikipedia does not mean that every editor that interacts with you has a conflict with you...although I believe that may be the perception you are attempting to push.

It is my belief that the member may be attempting to manipulate the review and myself as reviewer and may also be attempting to manipulate or shop for a GA on another.[14] He has made, myself and at least one other reviewer uncomfortable.[15] For this reason I have stepped back from the situation and have placed the article back to be reviewed. He then went to the article and changed the nomination to reflect his name which leads me to believe he is attempting to collect GA ratings as trophies even when he is not necessarily the main contributor.[16] (Last paragraph transposed from my talk page)[17] --Amadscientist (talk) 02:16, 18 June 2011 (UTC)--Amadscientist (talk) 02:16, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't know about anyone else...but I'm moving on now. If mistakes were made than we should discuss that of course, but I will no longer interact with the member and want nothing further to do with reviewing any of the members articles. Consensus can be a hard mistress and she doesn't always agree with us. Let her be the final judge if she is even interested now.--Amadscientist (talk) 04:14, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Withdrawing nominations before reviews to save time, effort and reduce workload

I had a number of articles that I had nominated. I have withdrawn them to reduce the workload of reviewers as the articles still need work and using review to bring them to standard at this time is just adding extra work to an already back logged project. As the articles are improved and are actually GA in my view I will renominate. Hopefully this will reduce any additional fixes that may be caught by a reviewer in the future.--Amadscientist (talk) 03:30, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, GAN isn't a place to nominate articles that need work to bring them up to the standard. They should already meet the criteria, peer review is the place to ask for comments on whether the artcile passes muster. Jezhotwells (talk) 13:10, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Two reviews which need new reviewers as user is retiring.

Hi all, I was wondering if anyone would be willing to take up the reviews for: Kesha's "Blow" and Lady Gaga's "Hair"? I've decided that due to real life circumstances I must semi-retire from wikipedia. — Lil_℧niquℇ №1 ^[talk] 22:39, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

I will take up Blow (song). Adabow (talk · contribs) 04:41, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

I will take up "Hair".--CallMeNathan • Talk2Me 05:02, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Racepacket

Racepacket (talk · contribs) has been banned from Wikipedia for the period of a year, and currently has some outstanding GA nominations. Talk:Getty Villa/GA5 has been taken up by Pyrotec (talk · contribs), but Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Wisconsin, San Francisco Arts & Athletics, Inc. v. United States Olympic Committee and Blue Line (Washington Metro) are outstanding. Is there some precedent here? What is the best course of action? J Milburn (talk) 00:26, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

I would suggest failing them since Racepacket is not around to address the issues. Dough4872 00:38, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

The nominator has zero obligation to participate in the review. While the nominator is usually the article's main author and the main person interested in fixing stuff, the fact is that GA reviews can happen even if the nom is actually dead. If the articles do not meet the criteria, then the problems should be described in the review, just like always. If it happens that there are no interested editors at those articles, then the problems will not be fixed, in which case the articles will not be listed as GA through this review. If the article meets the minimum standard set by the criteria, or if it happens that other editors are interested in fixing issues (if any) the reviewer identifies so that it meets the criteria within a reasonable length of time, then it should follow the normal process and ultimately be listed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:57, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree with WhatamIdoing. I would be happy to try and fix problems where I can. It is in the interests of the encyclopaedia, not a single editor. Adabow (talk · contribs) 05:05, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

I can agree with that in principle, but it would be rather frustrating for the reviewers if no one was there to respond to their comments. I've felt that pain before... J Milburn (talk) 12:02, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it's frustrating to think that an article is only an hour's worth of work away from being listed, but the work is more than you could comfortably do without feeling "involved", and nobody else is around to do that work. OTOH, when I know going into it that there are no editors available, it doesn't bother me. For example, I'm going to fail KC (patient) for lack of (any) other editors in a few days. This is the expected outcome from that nom. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:52, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, I'm happy to review "Phillips" and "Blue line", but they would be reviews "five" and "six" in a queue which already includes Talk:Getty Villa/GA1 at "fourth" place (which to avoid any confusion will be my 396th WP:GAN review, excluding GA-sweeps). So, please don't delist them due to lack of a nominator. Pyrotec (talk) 17:16, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't think the nominations should be removed summarily for lack of an unblocked nominator. We have an opportunity here as a community to deal with these nominations. If reviewed and they pass, they pass and get listed. If they don't pass on the first review, then they can be held pending someone willing to step up and deal with the content of the articles and the review comments. If no one shows up, they can be "not listed". Now, isn't that easy? Imzadi 1979 → 17:51, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

You're correct. GAN/GAR is a community-driven process and thus any nomination should not be affected even if a particular editor is blocked. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 04:53, 23 June 2011 (UTC)

Tricky NPOV

The article Canoe River train crash (review) has a very tricky NPOV issue; everything else in fine with the article, but it would be nice to get some feedback on that bit. The issue is a bit simplified that all available sources are more or less POV, so how does one create NPOV from that. Arsenikk ^(talk) 22:35, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't agree that all the sources are POV; a biography of one of the participants does not mean it is biased towards him. By that token, a biography article based on biography books would be POV. It could be, but I don't think it is in this case. Look, it's useless to describe here, people, read the article and the comments and engage us at the GAN review.--Wehwalt (talk) 22:44, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Reviewer retiring, need new reviewer

The current reviewer of Manila hostage crisis (review: Talk:Manila hostage crisis/GA1), Gatoclass, is leaving Wikipedia for a while and may not be able to complete the review.[18] Gatoclass left open the possibility that I ask for the article to be relisted for review, so I'm asking here for another reviewer to pick up on this review. Deryck C. 17:52, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Good article question

I have a quick question about good articles. I had two good articles up for good article nomination, which were Who We Are (Lifehouse album) and First Time (Lifehouse song). They were failed by User:Mattchewbaca in bad faith as you can see at: Wikipedia:Administrator's noticeboard/Incidents#User:Mattchewbaca. Do you think I should renominate both of these articles for a second good article nomination or have it as a first nomination since the review by Mattchewbaca was in bad faith? Thanks. - Rp0211 ^(talk2me) 06:13, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Renominate and put a note in the first review. I would also suggest that they are renominated with the original nomination dates. Jezhotwells (talk) 14:43, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

In fact I have gone ahead and renominated on your behalf. Jezhotwells (talk) 14:57, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Any way to stop a review without a formal Fail?

I'm reviewing, and the nominator and I now think it should be merge with another article? Is there a way to stop the review without a formal "Fail"? --Philcha (talk) 07:27, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Although the template used is called Template:FailedGA, the result is marked in the article history as "not listed". I would suggest leaving a not in the review about this and then implementing the article history. See Wikipedia:Reviewing good articles#Close and re-nominate. Jezhotwells (talk) 14:40, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps we should move the template, just to reduce confusion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:09, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

That is a consideration, but a good number of things would be affected, e.g. the various templates involved, the updating bots, etc. Quite a task. Let's see what others say. Jezhotwells (talk) 15:12, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Jezhotwells, just close the review normally as "not listed". It's perhaps less than optimal that the article history parameter value is "failed", but it really just means "not listed" for whatever reason, in this specific instance because of the merge discussion. Malleus Fatuorum 16:32, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Is suggestion (review Artcile X by editor A, and he may return the favor by reviewing your article) ok?

I was about to suggest to two editors that they may want to review one anther's article, speeding up the process. But how is such mutual review viewed? AGF on one side, there is some potential COI to be considered. Should I make this suggestion to the two editors, or would you advise against it? Your thoughts? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 22:38, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

I think it's entirely fine, so long as the reviews are well-done. When in doubt they should leans towards the nitpicky side since I'm sure that will be watched closely. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 23:23, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Obviously be careful to avoid the impression of quid pro quo.--Wehwalt (talk) 23:50, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

I personally think that sort of quid pro quo is bound to create conflicts of interest, and don't think it should be encouraged. (There is bound to be an impetus to avoid failing an article when the reviewers knows that the fail will make negative reviews of their own articles more likely.) Looie496 (talk) 00:27, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

(←ec) GAN reviewing is not about appearances, but about making the (usually) first GA review of an article as fair and accurate as it can be on whether the article meets the criteria. A nitpicky review is not necessarily a good review: such a review may require unnecessary changes, or overlook significant issues of coverage or bias. I do not think it is a good idea for editors to be reviewing each other's articles simultaneously, as it unnecessarily clouds editorial judgment. (I hope Wehwalt meant to say "even the impression...")

(Yes.--Wehwalt (talk) 12:36, 26 June 2011 (UTC))

On the other hand, this may not be what Piotrus is suggesting. It is a good idea to draw the attention of both editors to articles they might be willing to review. It is also fine in principle for Editor B to review an article by Editor A and then Editor A to review an article by Editor B (given the relatively small numbers of reviewers/editors involved in GA, this happens all the time, not just accidentally, but inevitably). However, in such a circumstance, Editor B should ensure that the review takes place uninfluenced by any expectation of "return favors" by Editor A, and after the review is complete, Editor A should only review the article of Editor B if Editor A is confident that their judgment will be unaffected (positively or negatively) by the conduct/outcome of the earlier review by Editor A. (The same principles apply to all editors reviewing articles by other reviewers.)

Per Wizardman's last remark, the editors should feel comfortable to invite (indeed welcome) comments and scrutiny from other reviewers. In that case, they probably don't need such scrutiny, and the process will be speeded up. Otherwise, reassessment is likely, and time saved at GAN is a false economy. Geometry guy 01:17, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

This is probably more common during WikiCup, when people are particularly keen to see their stuff reviewed. I don't really see it as too different to solicitations for review on the WikiCup pages, when the likely targets are also WikiCup participants (I'm not in it this year, FWIW). I've been asked twice recently if I'd mind reviewing the article of someone reviewing mine, but in both cases the requests related to articles I'd probably review anyway because they're in my line of country. I don't think I'm any tougher or easier in such cases, just my usual pedantic self... ;-) Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:56, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for you willingness to review my page :). The GA review for Charles Read (RAAF officer) should start soon, and I expect it to be straight forward, given your history of excellent biography-writing. Sp33dyphil ^{"Ad astra"} 12:17, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

I mostly concur with the above. I know there were times that I started a review and then the nominator started reviewing my own work, which I found somewhat surprising and hostile, but if you cannot argue with the quality of the review and are mindful of the pitfalls I don't see why it's a problem by itself. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 21:32, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

I think that the WikiCup has muddied the waters here, and I am not happy with quid pro quo reviews. Malleus Fatuorum 22:41, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely NOT, due to WP:COI! All we need is two editors out of the Family Guy Wikiproject and all of a sudden, every single Family Guy episode article will be listed at GA! Ok, so that's just one example, but you get the point. Too much room for abuse here,... WTF? (talk) 16:39, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

This issue has been raised and shot down many times in the past that it warrants an entry at perennial proposal. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:23, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Someone please remove me from review of the YF-22

Resolved

I clicked that I would review it, but I am sort of Wiki-tired. Besides that, I need to read the criteria and figure out how to do GA reviews. Not sure when I will get to it, so please put the article back in queue with no prejudice.TCO (talk) 03:52, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Looks like that has been fixed. Jezhotwells (talk) 15:01, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Thank youTCO (talk) 15:41, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Please take over Talk:Golding Bird/GA1

Resolved

Would someone please take over Talk:Golding Bird/GA1. I have an persistent illness which weakens my stamina and concentration, and Golding Bird is a fairly long and detailed article. I regret that I will not be fit to review further articles to GA standard. --Philcha (talk) 13:17, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Wizardman has kindly taken over. --Philcha (talk) 20:37, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Sorry to hear about this, Philcha - you have contributed much to this project. Jezhotwells (talk) 21:29, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Klemens von Metternich GA1

Hi

The article Klemens von Metternich was nominated but failed (GA1 here). The review was, IMHO less than satisfactory, but it should be noted that it was the reviewers first attempt (I believe) and they did ask for advice here.

I have advised the nominating editor to re-submit; however, I am unsure as to which it should be: a re-nomination or a community review.

Can someone please take a quick look and advise as to which it should be, if any (as it may also be that the review is correct of course!) Thanks Chaosdruid (talk) 16:08, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Either could be done, but I think that a re-nom is the simpler approach in this instance. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:56, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

It is fairly rare for a "not listed" decision to be overturned at GAR, renomination is usually the more straightforward and quicker option. Jezhotwells (talk) 23:20, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice, I will suggest that course of action to the nominating editor. Chaosdruid (talk) 23:42, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

GAbot screwup

After I passed Inception, why did the bot say I failed it.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 05:37, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Just saw that. I think that it was because the talk page had {{FailedGA}} and recognised it as a fail. I just built up {{ArticleHistory}} on the talk page - I think if you do this instead of listing {{GA}} alongside {{FailedGA}} it will correctly recognise as a pass. Anyway, it isn't much of an issue if the GA bot thinks that it's a fail, as long as you have added {{GA}} and listed the article at WP:GA. Adabow (talk · contribs) 05:43, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

You would think by now we have the bot trained to understand that a page=1 fail and a page=2 pass is a pass. Oh well. At least I understand now.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 06:27, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

OK to remove drive-by nom?

Resolved

Jezhotwells (talk) 19:36, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Hill 262 has been nominated by someone who has never worked on the article, is already a milhist A-Class, and the primary writers are unavailable at the moment to respond to a review. I think the simplest solution is to remove the nom from the list but I'd prefer to leave that to someone more familiar with GA these days that I am. Thanks! EyeSerene^talk 11:42, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

When we say that anyone can nominate an article, we actually mean anyone, even someone who has never worked on the article.

There's no rule requiring anybody to participate in the review except the reviewer. Especially for an article that is milhist A-class, there might not be anything for anyone else to say, other than "Thanks for reviewing this." I've certainly done reviews that were open-and-shut listings. It's normal for other editors to participate, and a higher percentage of such noms end up being listed, but it's not strictly speaking necessary.

Besides, by the time the review actually gets started (often takes two months), the editors might be perfectly happy to respond to any questions. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:48, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply. The reason I ask is because I recall a time (admittedly going back a few years!) when drive-by noms were regularly removed. As the primary author and maintainer I don't actually want a GA review at the moment: I'm not particularly available; I don't have ready access to my sources; and tbh despite its A-Class status the article has changed significantly since that review and needs further work. It's rather annoying that a nomination can be imposed on me against my wishes before the article is ready, but I'll do what I can to cooperate :) EyeSerene^talk 07:49, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

I have on occasion removed noms that were made without discussion by editors who had never contributed to an article. It would be polite to discuss the issue first with the editor who nominated it, though, if that is possible. Looie496 (talk) 00:19, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

I have left a note at User talk:BenjaminMarine9037 Jezhotwells (talk) 20:13, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

There has been no response from the nominator, even though they are still actively eding, so I have removed the nomination. Jezhotwells (talk) 19:36, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your help. EyeSerene^talk 09:33, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

GAN-PR issues

I'm noticing an uptick in articles that are simultaneously sent to GAN and PR, apparently in the hopes that issues can be addressed while it waits in the queue. While there's no rule against it, it causes an article to stick in two backlogs, and I'm wondering if this is something we need to start policing. If an article's at PR, then it's implying that it's not ready for a GA nom; if that's the case then wait for the PR to wrap up. Then again, maybe I'm just noticing issues where none exist. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 01:20, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, I too have noticed this. Perhaps we should make this an explicit rule. For many articles that I have failed, I have suggested for instance -> Copy-edit -> PR, then GAN. I am not suggesting that PR be a requirement pre-GAN, but articles should not be at both places simultaneously. PR is a good first step where nominators are uncertain about whether articles meet the GA criteria. Jezhotwells (talk) 01:34, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

I also agree. For articles that are close, a GA review will likely catch and fix minor errors that would be caught by PR, for articles that aren't close, they should be improved as much as possible before GA review. Canada Hky (talk) 01:36, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Whilst I don't disagree, the 'level' of PR within the assessment structure is not that clear. The blurb at the top of WP:PR reads "Wikipedia's peer review process... is intended for high-quality articles that have already undergone extensive work, often as a way of preparing a featured article candidate." So perhaps we can say that editors shouldn't be able to use them to fix GANs – the sorts of faults a GAN might be in problems with are likely to be below PR-level? Or is it the case that PRs aren't actually at the close-to-FA level as implied? Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 07:17, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

In a way, that's what I'm getting at. Peer review can be done before GAN, after GAN, before FAC, whichever the writer feels is their goal with the article. After going a read through PR, it contains all types of articles, from ones that aren't close to here to ones that are ready for FA. Doing a PR before bringing it here is entirely fine, as it's usually a quicker process; having an article reviewed twice in a row for what should be the same problems just cuts into an already thin group of reviewers on both ends. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 23:26, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

Has anyone talked to the WP:PR defacto director Ruhrfisch (talk · contribs) about changing the policy on what is eligible for PR. In the past, he has stated that GACs are welcome although, it may be the case that PR is getting backed up. Note that PR is a 30 day process for the most part and most GACs are on review for beyond 30 days.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 18:58, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

PR, as you noted, is generally a quick process, with maybe a week holdup before a review. That's why we might as well let the review happen first, since it could be the difference between a quick fail and a hold here. If I were to review yours now I'd have to wait on the peer review to see what happens there, which isn't really fair to any party. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 19:18, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Why would you have to wait? I wouldn't wait. Articles nominated at GAN are expected to meet the GA criteria; they either do or they don't. And besides, the normal GAN holding period is seven days anyway. Added to which could be argued that an article submitted to a PR may well not be stable, as the issues brought up in the PR are addressed. Malleus Fatuorum 19:23, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't know where you get an average holding period of 7 days. I looked at the 6/7/11 and 7/7/11 WP:GANR and found that of the 311 nominations less than 45 days old on 6/7 46% were still on review on 7/7 (30 days later). PRs autoclose within 30 days for the most part. Thus, it is pretty likely that you will get PR feedback before GAN. I just don't think an individual, even a vet like Wizardman, should change PR policy without getting consensus and the opinion of the PR director.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 19:28, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

The point is that the hold period is supposed to be seven days. Unfortunately no one enforces this anymore, which may contribute more to the backlog than the quantity of noms itself. I'll ask the guys at PR about this, though I don't see them minding much one way or the other. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 19:40, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Technically, you don't have to ask them. But if there is a change at GAC that they don't accept any current PR noms, that can be done without PR consent. If this is going to be the case, it has to be done at a policy level that is transparent and consistent at WP:GAC. Don't just have one or two editors decide that on all their reviews they are removing GAC tags from current PRs but then everybody else allows both simultaneously. Personally, I am against the change and don't think it should be made by two or three editors. I think it is a major policy change and probably dozens of editors care about the decision. Having a semi-retired editor and a couple other guys come to a conclusion is not the right thing. There should be some sort of support-oppose call for this kind of change.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:20, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

I see it as rather analagous to the difference between case law and statute law. If I decide, for instance, that an article simultaneously at GAN and PR is by definition unstable then it fails GA criterion 5. That doesn't require an Act of Parliament. Malleus Fatuorum 22:26, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Where did I say anything about an average holding period? Malleus Fatuorum 19:56, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

I think that a policy change should be discussed. Is the the right talk page or should it be at WT:GA? I would be happy to phrase the question, subject to input from others. Jezhotwells (talk) 22:40, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

I think either here or at the WT:WPGA. There is a more proper place, but here gets more traffic. However an announcement of a policy discussion should be made here at WT:WPGA and at WT:GA. Then, there should be discussion and a call for support-oppose opinions. I am not totally opposed to the policy change because the quality of GA is really rising. It may be appropriate to view PR as a step below, but I am not sure and would probably oppose.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 23:27, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Concerns about Vere Bird, Jr. review

Resolved

Jezhotwells (talk) 23:29, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

(note: I have moved this section here from WT:WPGA. Looie496 (talk) 23:05, 7 July 2011 (UTC))

I'm very concerned about the review process at Talk:Vere Bird, Jr./GA1. See also User talk:Electronscope44 and User talk:Ironholds. I think the review process is currently going far outside the remit of the GA process. GA reviews are supposed to be lightweight; this one is most certainly not. It would be useful if someone could provide some guidance on whether this is going in the right direction or not. I have seen other reviews go far off into similar territory and the results have never been pleasant for any of the parties involved. —Tom Morris (talk) 14:10, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

From what I see, there seems to be some concerns about verifiability, prose, and coverage from the nominator. That being said, there seems to be an issue here regarding accessibility of sources, which seems to stem from a case of FUTON bias. I wonder if there is a misunderstanding in the type of English understanding with regards to the prose. As far as referencing is concerned, it seems acceptable, and a GAN can't be failed if there are zero illustrations (as opposed to an FAC, which it would fail).

What I would recommend is that someone who is especially knowledgeable in British English grammar and usage do a prose check. Otherwise, one of the few things I agree with in the original nominator are the couple of coverage issues mentioned, but after going through the GA review again, there's not much there. –MuZemike 15:53, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

The GA review process is supposed to be lightweight, in that there's just one reviewer involved. But GA reviews themselves are often quite thorough, as well they should be. Take a look at Talk:George W. Romney/GA1 just to pick one example, where I was being reviewed by User:Steve Smith, one of the best reviewers in WP. Wasted Time R (talk) 03:04, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

• Butting in; there's no question that reviews shouldn't be thorough. Malleus normally does mine, for gods sakes :P. While reviews should be thorough, they should not contain personal attacks, general screamy statements of "oh, this is all a waste of time" and the general impression that the reviewer doesn't want to be there. Ironholds (talk) 22:24, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Given that (a) the reviewer does not seem to have the experience to carry out a proper review, and (b) the reviewer is currently indef-blocked, it might be appropriate to terminate the review so that somebody else can take it up. Looie496 (talk) 23:10, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Renominated with original timestamp as reviewer is blocked. Jezhotwells (talk) 23:29, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Pancake GAN

What are the criteria for a quick-fail? It appears that Puffin (talk · contribs) nominated Pancake for GA status, despite doing no work on the article. A quick glance at the article revealed widespread violations of WP:MOS, WP:RS, and WP:NOR. Given that he has also done no work on the article (other than nominating it for GA and tagging all the B-class criteria as "yes", I am wondering whether to just fail it immediately. Thanks! Reaper Eternal (talk) 20:35, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Not sure if there is actual guidance, but looking at the article, I don't think that applying your discretion is going to go down badly. They few 'quick fail' candidates I've seen have been nominated by editors, often relatively new, who don't understand the system. Gentle does it. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 20:40, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

That article's not even close; one (small) section even has four {{cn}} tags in it. If that's not a quick-fail then I don't know what is. I'd leave a few pointers as to the work needed to get the article up to GA standard and fail it. Malleus Fatuorum 20:42, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

I have several times simply removed a nomination for an article that is clearly not ready, and has been nominated by an editor who never contributed to it, without any discussion on the talk page, and if nobody has yet started a review. I know this violates the strict rules, but I view it as an IAR situation. It doesn't usually do any harm to attempt discussion with the nominator before acting, though. Looie496 (talk) 23:39, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

I think it's more helpful to leave a review pointing out at least the issues most in need of attention: the article's been nominated, it's not been listed, and here's why. That way anyone interested knows what needs to be done. Malleus Fatuorum 23:47, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I left some comments at Talk:Pancake/GA1, but since he doesn't seem to understand why it is failing, I have pointed him to WP:WIAGA and offered to look it over again after he has finished sourcing and rewriting everything before he resubmits. Thanks guys. EDIT: I pointed out the main weakness in the article: the almost total lack of reliable sources and MOS compliance/prose quality. Reaper Eternal (talk) 23:58, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

That seems fine to me, and pretty much what I'd have done in your place. So perfect really. :-) Malleus Fatuorum 00:06, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

GA logs?

Is there an automated log of this month's successful GA noms, similar to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Featured log/July 2011? – Quadell ^(talk) 13:31, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Oops, I just found Wikipedia:Good articles/recent. Nevermind! – Quadell ^(talk) 17:40, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

The log is at Wikipedia:Good articles/Log. warrior4321 18:08, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Even better! – Quadell ^(talk) 18:15, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

And Wikipedia:Good article statistics has useful info. Jezhotwells (talk) 22:20, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Good articles/Log lists the page on Akshata Sen on the date of July 7 as GA class. But the page itself is in abysmal state and has an AfD tag on it and IMHO, should even be deleted. Can somebody check into it? - DSachan (talk) 00:54, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

It was done by an IP on a drive-by review. By definition, IPs can nominate but cannot review GA. It's already reverted back to start class. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 17:40, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Looking for advice

I've started reviewing GA noms after a long period of inactivity, and I periodically have questions about what is and is not acceptable in a GA. I know the reviewer has wide latitude in these things, but still, I was wondering if other reviewers might have some advice on some points. (And is there a more appropriate venue for these sorts of questions?)

1. Is it appropriate for a link to be in the "External links" section, and also included as a footnoted reference?
2. If an article (of, for instance, a specific place) has no images, and no free images are known to exist online, but it's obvious that free images could be created by someone at the location... does this pass criterion #6?
3. Is it appropriate for an article on a tragedy to contain a list of the victims (most otherwise non-notable)? Does the number of victims affect this answer?

Thanks for any tips, – Quadell ^(talk) 12:35, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

(1) I assume by External links you are refering to a web page, or pages. If it/they are used as citations, I don't see the need to include them again in External links - but I'm not sure I would regard that as meriting failure if that were to be done. (2) Criteria 6 states "if possible", you can't put a review On Hold until someone goes and takes some pictures, or fail it because no free images are known to exist online. I don't understand the last two part-question. "Is it appropriate for an article on a tragedy to contain a list of the victims (most otherwise non-notable)?", what is the point of the most otherwise non-notable in brackets? I don't expect an article on e.g. World War I to list all the names of those who died, perhaps it might be of interest to list those who died in the World Trade Centers in 9/11 (still a lot of people), but would I fail such an article if it do not give a list of the dead - probably not. Pyrotec (talk) 14:01, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

1. No, see Wikipedia:EL#References and citation
2. Yes, as per Pyrotec above
3. Probably not as per Pyrotec above; Wikipedia is not a memorial site. If there are only a few, e.g. two or three it may be OK - but would it be necessary for complete understanding of the subject? Jezhotwells (talk) 22:39, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, both of you. I may have similar questions in the future... I suppose I'll ask them here, if no better spot presents itself. – Quadell ^(talk) 01:45, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Another possibility to is post questions at WT:WikiProject Good articles. Either place is likely to get you a useful response. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:29, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

St. John's

I nominated the article St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador earlier this year, at the time it was put on hold and eventually failed due to the introduction not being long enough. I have since expanded the introduction and the member that had originally reviewed the article has since helped me expand the introduction and so they fell they are unable to re-assess the article. I was wondering if I had to go through the whole review process again just to get the introduction reviewed or not? Newfoundlander&Labradorian (talk) 15:08, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I'm afraid that you do need to go through the whole review process again. Malleus Fatuorum 16:41, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Quick Question

Hi, my names MayhemMario and i've have done quite a lot of GA reviews and nomiantions lately (Heather Chasen, Dotty Cotton, Manda Best etc...) Well whilst reveiwing Si Una Vez the user who nominated it (User:AJona1992) english wasnt great as the article was full of past tenses where they shouldnt be (etc...). The other day another user, (User:Belovedfreak) noticed the same thing but this time told him on talk page, the discussion is here. Then I put forward the idea if he does the main bulk of the review and I just do the english/grammar/punctuation side of it, AJona could still do GA reviews. He agreed. What im asking is can we do a joint review of an article, and has it ever been done before? MayhemMario 19:35, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Well we wouldn't want to say it like that. Belovedfreak said it more calmly and professional then what you said it lolz. So hope she doesn't take it the wrong when she reads it :/ AJona1992 (talk) 19:39, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

I changed it :) MayhemMario 19:44, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

No problem with doing joint reviews, I've done several myself. Bear in mind though that you'll have to be able to agree on the article's promotion or not, unless one of you assumes the role of lead reviewer. Malleus Fatuorum 19:52, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Well I know that when the bot adds it, it says just by AJona though on the actuall list its by both of us, AJona is more of the lead, but at the end of the day, were both reveiwing it, we both get the credit for it. MayhemMario 19:54, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

What credit? Why is it about credit?

PS. If you're claiming to be an English guru then you might want to correct your spelling of "reveiwing", "actuall", "its", and "were". ;-) Malleus Fatuorum 20:03, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Feedback request service

Recently, the Feedback Request Service was successfully implemented. This allows for users who sign up for certain request for comment categories to be randomly notified of an RFC at a frequency of their choosing. This works like opt-in jury duty and allows people to participate more casually in the RFC process than if they were to keep abreast of all goings-on at RFC. A similar system could be implemented at Good Article Nominations, where those who opt-in will be notified at random of a new good article nomination, similar for the process used at RFC. Is this an idea worth pursuing? If you are interested, you can sign up at Wikipedia:Feedback request service#Good article nominations. hare j 04:52, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

I think that's an excellent idea. It's actually a thought I had in the back of my mind from ages ago, that if the system is set up and working for RFCs, it can then be expanded for other things that could do with pulling in randomized input from people. Rd232 ^talk 09:42, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Nomination for Battle of the Wilderness

Hi the Battle of the Wilderness was nominated for a GA review by User:Wild Wolf at 19:52, 15 June 2011. The article is not ready for GA as suggested on Talk:Battle of the Wilderness#GA review and agreed by the original author. A request for the nominator to remove the nomination has so far not been acted or commented upon. It would be easy to quick fail but then that would be on the article history. Is there any way someone other than the nominator can remove the nomination? Jim Sweeney (talk) 06:49, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Since no GA review has been opened, the {{GA nominee}} can be removed from the article's talkpage and that effective removes it from GAN (the bot should remove it from Wikipedia:Good article nominations). As stated above, if a review were to be opened, the review would need to be closed and that review would be part of the article's history. An article can be nominated by any user (registered or not), and in this case another editor claims the role of principle editor. Perhaps the nominator does not wish to remove it from the review. Anyone could be WP:BOLD and remove it, but getting the agrement of the nominator first would be prefered since the nominator might immediately renominate it. Pyrotec (talk) 08:31, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks will BE BOLD and delete the nom.Jim Sweeney (talk) 08:34, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

US National Archives featured article contest

The Charters of Freedom on display at the National Archives' rotunda.

I would like to announce the first featured (or good) article contest for the US National Archives WikiProject, as part of the National archives' ongoing collaboration with Wikipedia. The National Archives has graciously provided us with prizes to give out to winners, including National Archives publications, tote bags, and other swag. This first contest is a challenge to get any of the articles on the three documents on display in the National Archives building's rotunda—the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights—featured (in any language). There is a smaller prize for achieving good article status.

Please read more about how to participate here. Good luck! Dominic·t 21:14, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Not to be pessimistic, but I see at least two major problems with this: a very small number of articles, necessarily limiting the number of editors who could conceivably get a prize, and choosing very high-profile and demanding articles. YMMV. Nikkimaria (talk) 04:26, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

That problem is easily solved by writing the article in a language that hardly anyone speaks, and getting the other five speakers of that language to agree that it's an FA, as happened with the British Museum's initiative. Malleus Fatuorum 04:36, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't think maligning the contributions of non-English speakers is very constructive, or particularly relevant here. Dominic·t 14:46, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't think you really understand what I'm talking about Dominic. How many native Latin speakers are there in the world today for instance do you think? What you also don't understand is that the FA process on the English Wikipedia is far more rigorous than on any other Wikipedia. Malleus Fatuorum 16:33, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Well, if we're meant to be ambitious...how about we set up a rigorous FA process over at the Scots Wikipedia? AFAICT the Unitit States Constituition doesn't exist there yet. Nikkimaria (talk) 04:57, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Daniel Coughlin/GA1

A somewhat infrequent editor has not properly closed Talk:Daniel Coughlin/GA1.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 11:54, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

P.S. As director, I try not to close WP:CHICAGO related GACs.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 11:55, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Ok, done it. Jezhotwells (talk) 12:23, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Mavis Wilton recieves nasty review

Here is the worst review I've ever had. This article was nominated on the 3 May, it just had a review. However the editor was blatantly rude and curt throughout. So it now has to re-enter the cue because the editor won't let anyone else review it before he fails it. Anyone willing to review it? Is there nothing that could be done to keep it at the top of the list?RaintheOne ^BAM 17:13, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

MF has indeed been a bit over the top here, but maybe if the article was given a complete rewrite to bring it up to standard it would have a secure future. You know, having a look around GA is quite revealing. I saw an article passed GA a little while back which is still horribly cringeworthy. Maybe the GA process needs revisiting, and some of the reviewers sent back to English classes. 2C. Moriori (talk) 20:57, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Can you recommend any good English classes that I might be able to attend? Malleus Fatuorum 21:06, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Wow, you thought I was specifying you? No, I said "some of the reviewers". Moriori (talk) 21:23, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

As it happens I agree with you; clearly not every GA reviewer is up to the task, and too many seem to have very little understanding of how to write even tolerably well. Malleus Fatuorum 21:28, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Let Malleus finish the review. The prose needs work, and he's the best around to help. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 21:21, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Let me state this bluntly. Raintheone claims that I'm a bad reviewer, but the truth is that he's a bad nominator. Malleus Fatuorum 01:03, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Just to close the circle, Raintheone and I managed to come to an understanding and with the help of several other editors the article is now listed as a GA. Malleus Fatuorum 15:33, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Request for 2nd opinion at Talk:Portia labiata/GA1

I request for a 2nd opinion at Talk:Portia labiata/GA1. The reviewer, Binksternet, demands that the lead be only 4 paras, despite the banner at the top of WP:LEAD, which says, "Use common sense in applying it; it will have occasional exceptions." I showed that the leads of several of my zoology GAs have more than 4 paras, including the jumping spiders Maevia inclemens (with Casliber) and Phaeacius (with Stemonitis), as the subjects are complex. Binksternet replied, "The other reviewers are not my concern at this time. I think they were lax." Binksternet also wants me to restructure the lead so that the "interesting parts" are at the top of the lead: "cannibalism, trickery, mimicry, stabbing, venom and intelligence". My concern is that the result would be incoherent - these behaviours are based on the size and appearance, body structure, movement, senses, and hunting. I suggest we review the rest of the article and then return to the lead, and Binksternet replied that he/she had read the rest but would not review the rest of the article unless the lead was resolved. --Philcha (talk) 14:46, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Philcha says that his article is an exception to the guideline at WP:LEAD but in fact many of his articles have more than four paragraphs in the lead section, weakening the argument for this particular one. An exception should be exceptional rather than habitual, but Philcha habitually excepts himself from the guideline. Binksternet (talk) 15:20, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Focusing on just this one article, I don't think the lead section is well written. It immediately bogs down into how many millimetres the male is vs the female and does not recover any momentum. It does not engage the reader; rather, it puts him off. I think that it can be made more interesting at the same time as being reshaped into three or four paragraphs. Binksternet (talk) 15:28, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Binksternet here, and I'd say that the lead was about twice as long as it really ought to be. Malleus Fatuorum 15:29, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

The lede is way too long and contains way, way too much detail. It really just needs to be a summary with few, if any, references in it. Ajh1492 (talk) 15:30, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Binksternet's "Philcha habitually excepts himself from the guideline" is visibly untrue, see User:Philcha#Improved_and_got_passed_as_GA, where you'll find articles with 2-4 paras.

I use new para if a new idea appears, especially if it is used in more than one subsequent topic - e.g. vision, on which navigation, hunting amd mating are based. See also User:Philcha#My_thoughts_on_style, which strongly recommends 1 para per idea - from authorities in web usability.

The banner at the top of WP:LEAD says, "Use common sense in applying it; it will have occasional exceptions." The behaviours of Portias are exceptionally complex, and have been compared with lions ("Eight-legged cats" and how they see: a review of recent research on jumping spiders")

Binksternet also wants me to restructure the lead so that the "interesting parts" are at the top of the lead: "cannibalism, trickery, mimicry, stabbing, venom and intelligence". If so, I might as well produce a 1-para lead, as any later paras could just be qualifications on the 1st para. And Binksternet's use of "intelligence" is a gross exaggeration, as I said in the GA review, but Binksternet has obviously ignored that. --Philcha (talk) 14:49, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Binksternet also wants me to remove points that help to differentiate P. labiata from other Portias, other jumping spiders, other spiders, etc. --Philcha (talk) 14:49, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

However, if that's everyone wants, see this 1 para lead, which covers all the topics in which Binksternet is interested. --Philcha (talk) 14:49, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

If you check the diff above, you may find some important behaviours which Binksternet apparently missed (2nd last and 3rd last paras in the diff). --Philcha (talk) 14:49, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

If you find the revised lead too concise or if you want some additional sub-topics to be included, please ask me. --Philcha (talk) 14:49, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I did not intend to anger you or push you to engage in disrupting Wikipedia to illustrate a point. I gave suggestions for a rewrite of the lead section, not a template. Binksternet (talk) 15:12, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I was not "engaging in disrupting Wikipedia to illustrate a point." Binksternet wanted the lead to start with what Binksternet considered the most interesting aspect, and I gave that. I've just added at the end of 1 para "All these behaviours rely on this animal's vision, which is more acute than a cat's and 10 times as acute as a dragonfly's," as most sources regard the vision as the distinctive feature of jumping spiders and on which all other behaviours rely. --Philcha (talk) 21:35, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

At Binksternet wrote, "Yes, and the themes that are somewhat similar can be made to share paragraphs. Certainly one paragraph can handle where they live and the fact that one population solves problems differently than another. Another paragraph can describe the physical size, the eyes, how they hunt and what they eat. That's two paragraphs; the first few sentences of the lead paragraph can introduce the most interesting points to grab reader interest: cannibalism, trickery, mimicry, stabbing, venom and intelligence. Let the reader know that this is one of the weirdest spiders in the world":

• "intelligence" is an exaggeration, and sources most usually say "cognitive abilities" or similar. Does Binksternet want such a phrase in the lead? "Some of these tactics use trial and error" is accurate, and in this sentence I've added "although local populations of P. labiata differ in their use of it." --Philcha (talk)
• So I've dealt with about half the points Binksternet made above. I'll look at size and appearance, including looking like detritus, in the morning. --Philcha (talk) 21:35, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Shouldn't this discussion be taking place on the review page? Jezhotwells (talk) 02:11, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup GANs

In order for the WikiCup to be fair, the WikiCup points for GAs need to be attainable, meaning that GANs from WikiCup members need to be reviewed within a reasonable amount of time. If they're not reviewed within a reasonable amount of time, the bottleneck creates an unfair advantage to the people that are not getting their points from GAs. Since no one wants that, I urge reviewers to tackle the following GAs:

• Adabow has one pending, Always Be Here.
• Hurricanehink has three pending, Tropical Storm Danielle (1986), 1865 Atlantic hurricane season, Hurricane Bridget (1971)
• Resolute has one pending, 2010–11 Calgary Flames season
• Miyagawa has two pending, Meat dress of Lady Gaga, HMS Tabard (P342)
• Wizardman has three pending, Rex Ryan, Aruba at the 2008 Summer Olympics, Jeriome Robertson
• PresN has one pending, Music of Nier
• Piotrus has three pending, Władysław IV Vasa, Ewelina Hańska, and Battle of Bautzen (1945)
• Another Believer has one pending, Live at Benaroya Hall with the Seattle Symphony
• Sp33dyphil has five pending, Sukhoi Su-33, Boeing/Sikorsky RAH-66 Comanche, Sukhoi Su-35, Sukhoi Su-37, McDonnell Douglas AV-8B Harrier II

I will be giving barnstars out to anyone that helps clear these out. The barnstar is being done for the review, and will be given irregardless of the final outcome, however insta-passing or insta-failing, (i.e. screwing these people over for a star), won't fly. Please send me a talk page message linking the review once it's completed to claim your star. Since I'm not counting and didn't list the GANs that were already in the process of review as of this posting, I count 20 barnstars for the taking here. Please note that this round of the Wikicup ends on August 29, so this offer is only good until then. Sven Manguard Wha? 05:42, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

It would seem in their own best interest for competitors to review each others nominations, that would leave those not involved in the cup to continue with the remaining outstanding reviews. Jim Sweeney (talk) 07:04, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

I actually asked one of them about exactly that, even suggesting that he review people in the other group so that there would be less of a conflict. I don't remember exactly what he said, but the gist of it is that he would feel weird doing so because they would be his rivals for the next round. Thinking about it, I have to agree that there is a COI concern. The illusion of impropriety, even if no impropriety took place, would still have the potential to cause disturbance or even taint the competition. Sven Manguard Wha? 07:29, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Granted then it would seem fair for competitors to review another article submitted by someone not in the cup. Of course this cannot be enforced only a suggestion, it may even make other editors respond in a quid pro quo arrangement. Jim Sweeney (talk) 08:00, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Why should WikiCup nominations be given preference, and why one barnstar per review? Another solution would be for one editor (Sven Manguard?) to review all the WP:CUP nominations. Twenty reviews in one month and three days is acheivable, several people have done that number of reviews (including myself) (and in some cases very many more) in one month. Now that would be worth a barnstar. Pyrotec (talk) 14:42, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Pyrotec, you make a very good point (and a point that I was about to make myself) - there is no reason that WikiCup nominations should be given preference by reviewers. Sven, it is not the reviewers' job to make sure that the cup is "fair", and I would even venture to say that the majority of the reviewers here really couldn't care less about people getting points. I know there are even a few (maybe more than a few?) reviewers that specifically avoid WikiCup noms of any sort because of the points/winning mentality they believe the cup creates. It's nice of you to give out barnstars, but to ask unpaid volunteers to give preference to one group of articles over another just so that other editors can get pretty baubles is a bit OTT. Dana boomer (talk) 15:34, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

None of you have to do anything if you don't want to. Since my request isn't harming anything I'm not sure why you're going out of your way to dump on it, as oppose to, say, just ignoring the thread. That aside though, the reason I asked others to do this rather than do this myself is that I'm rather awful at recognizing good prose from bad prose. I tried to do a GAN before, and it went miserably. I figured I'd ask the people that do it on a regular basis, since they'd be able to do it correctly. Since I've got nothing but flak for this though, I think I'll just unwatchlist this discussion so that I don't have to suffer though the next round of responses. Have fun making people feel bad for trying to be nice. Real good work you're doing with that. Sven Manguard Wha? 19:43, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

I will try to do some GAN reviews today if I get time. Casliber (talk · contribs) 21:22, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Comment to Sven Manguard. No one (well I'm not) is giving you flack. As you say, it is our choice whether we individually give preference to reviewing Wikicup nominations, and in return you will award barnstars. I ask why preference should be given to wikiCup nominations (and why one barnstar per review) and another editor makes the same point in another way. If you are not prepared to answer the question, that is fine by me. I did review 58 GAN articles in one month in the April 2010 backlog elimination drive (see Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/GAN backlog elimination drives/April 2010), which was hard work; and the next time round in March 2011 I only managed 15 (see Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/GAN backlog elimination drives/March 2011). Your request is not harming me, but I will not be giving preference to WikiCup GANs, and I don't regard "fairness" of WikiCup points awards as being my responsibility: it belongs to the WikiCup organisers. WikiCup organisers make the arrangements for contestants to get awards but then expect another project to review those nominations: without any consulation. This is not a new topic, it has been raised before on these pages and elsewhere, by contestants not by the organisers, at the last WikiCup and the one before. Your offer of barnstars for reviewing is kind hearted, and has never been made before. I only accept responsibly for reviewing fairly those GAN nominations that I choose to accept to review (at present that's 401 GAN reviews completed and four more ready to start). Other editors may well be prepared to take up your offer, and one has already stated that above. Pyrotec (talk) 21:52, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

I certainly won't be giving special attention to WikiCup nominations. I shall carry on as usual. If the WikiCup organisers need reviewers then they can recruit them. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:12, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree. I've just looked at WP:Wikicup and see that, in reviewing, there are only points for points for GAR. I suggest there should be points for GAN, FAR, and FAC - and heavy penalties for careless reviews. --Philcha (talk) 07:23, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

With 30 points for a Good Article and only 2 for a GA review. I would suggest the Wikicup needs to have more respect for the GA process and reviewers. Jim Sweeney (talk) 07:35, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I agree, but those points are only available to Wikicup contestants. As a GA reviewer I'm not too inclined to sign up for Wikicup in order to get (2) points for reviewing their nominations; I'd probably get eliminated in the first round, and that removes the "incentive" to do any more of their reviews. But more importantly I don't see why wikicup article nominations should gain priority over other nominees, there are also several sets of educational assignements and supprise supprise once these article have sat in the queue for several months panic sets in (to be fair to Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus, advance warning is given of his educational needs but its still hard to get sufficient reviewers: other educational coordinators just don't give warnings) and priority is also requested for these GA nominations. Pyrotec (talk) 09:44, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Sven, I appreciate the intent of this message, but I've got to agree with Pyrotech that we should not be giving WikiCup nominations any kind of priority- opening this thread with "[i]n order for the WikiCup to be fair" really only sells it to those who support the WikiCup, rather than GA reviewers generally. I agree that it would be great to get everything nominated reviewed, and I am frequently encouraging participants to get reviewing (especially towards the end of rounds- IE, in a month's time) but there should be no kind of "hey, you reviewers, get on with WikiCup stuff". As for the other issue of two points for a GA review, two points were always meant to be a token amount, a "thank you for doing your bit". Last year, we encouraged participation in review processes, but didn't really reward it- this year, it may well tip the balance, as well as potentially showing competitors who are not "pulling their weight". What we did not want were people "farming" GA reviews for points; this would be potentially very damaging, even more so than, for instance, "farming" did you knows. There were a number of reasons we decided not to award points for other kinds of reviews, but it can essentially be boiled down to two key ones. Firstly, the community at FAC was strongly opposed to the idea, and, secondly, reviews elsewhere are not so quantifiable. A GA review is meant to be one person dealing with the entire review- a review at FAC could be anything from a few words to a long list and considerable work on the article. Of course, different GA reviews take different amounts of work and time (as a reviewer, I understand that) and some reviewers spend more time than others. We did introduce a bare minimum review ("Only reviews of a sufficient length will be counted; quick fails and very short reviews will not be awarded points. As a rough guide, no review shorter than 1000 bytes will be considered, though the judges reserve the right to remove other short reviews." This is not to say that shorter reviews are never decent reviews, it is just to say that they will not be awarded points.) However, we are of course open to suggestions for how reviewing points will work next year. J Milburn (talk) 10:01, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Not having been involved in the Wikicup, I can not speak from experience, but a requirement of submit one review one, would seem better. If only 5 points were awarded for a nomination and 30 points for a nomination and a review, it would give Wikicup competitors more incentive to take part in reviews. Not to say that they do not already take part.Jim Sweeney (talk) 10:45, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Submit one, review one is a HORRIBLE idea. In case the size of that text dosen't stress how bad of an idea it is, let me point you no further than DYK. It cleans out a backlog, but in the process the quality plummets because people that don't know how to do reviews or know that they can't do reviews right are placed in the position of having to review submissions. You all already have enough trouble with new reviewers promoting articles that really should never have gotten promoted, this will make it 10 times worse. Sven Manguard Wha? 21:51, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

I already reviewed three out within the last 30-45 days, but I've taken another two Polish-related ones to review. I can't pick up a third because I was tangentially involved with the article. Would be nice if more people stepped up to be reviewers. Would be nice if people NOT in the WikiCup were able to get our nominations reviewed too. Ajh1492 (talk) 12:43, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Well I've completed 401 reviews in almost three years and I'm not in wikicup. I have reviewed and do review articles from many parts of the world: British, Irish, Norwegian, Spanish-American, Latin-American, Australian, New Zealand, Arab, Indian, Isreali, French, Bulgarian and (I think) some Polish. To be brutally honest, some classifications of articles allways have a long waiting list: they tend to include sports, TV programes, pop stars, etc, and I seldom review many of these, and it seems that the people who write those article seldom review them either. Military articles also have a backlog, probably because there are more military articles being written than reviewed. So, if you want articles reviewed, write articles that editors are prepared to review (I'm sorry if that upsets miltary-article editors: I have no interest in sports, pop stars, etc). Pyrotec (talk) 19:17, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. In biology and medicine (where I both submit and review articles), for instance, reviews are often very quick. I've reviewed pop music articles in the past, but I've found that, often, the editors are not very responsive/receptive to criticism- fairly on unfairly, this has put me off reviewing them as much as I did. J Milburn (talk) 16:12, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

FWIW, I view the backlog as part of the competition... If I wanted to compete strategically, I'd focus on underrepresented areas. As it is, I knew going in that a sports article = 2 month wait. Resolute 02:27, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Time for another backlog elimination drive?

The GAN backlog is steadily creeping back up to 300 articles. The last one took place in March so perhaps it's time to tackle the backlog (again)? OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 06:39, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

It appears most of the backlog is TV Shows, Sports and Songs. Military history has a smaller backlog. Ajh1492 (talk) 15:10, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Wikicup is still running. If we have a drive now it will either encourage more wikicup nominations, which will increase the backlog at GAN, or it will remove the incentives for wikicup contestants to gain two cup points for each review that they do. I had assumed that it would be six months before the next backlog, or even 12 months. Pyrotec (talk) 15:35, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, most of the backlog is composed of poorly written boiler-plate TV episodes, pop songs and sports articles - many repeatedly renominated when editors don't like being told that the articles are sub-standard. Jezhotwells (talk) 17:35, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm fine with doing a drive in October, though at this point I've become exhausted just keeping up with the ever-increasing number of episode and song articles. One can only read so many of them. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:49, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I tend to avoid them for those reasons. Pyrotec (talk) 21:06, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I think many of us do, they're heavy going. Malleus Fatuorum 22:45, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Often badly written too. Time to tighten up the notability guidelines, I think. Jezhotwells (talk) 01:43, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Easier just to ignore them. Malleus Fatuorum 01:52, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but the problem is that semi-literate children review them and pass them despite obvious failings. Jezhotwells (talk) 02:10, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Which is why reviews done during backlog drives are much more thorough than the days without the drives, because each review will be further examined before awards/barnstars are handed out. The reviewers know that their reviews will be re-examined and if it could impact whether they can an award, they'll do a more detailed job. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 19:48, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Well who reviews them, and what evidence is there. Pyrotec (talk) 20:11, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

The coordinator(s) of the backlog elimination drive conduct spot-checks after the drive is over and before awards are handed out. Review progress. by the coordinator(s) are observed through the checkmarks as they progress through the reviews. (See 1, 2, 3, 4.) Being a good coordinator is more than just creating a page, recruiting reviewers, and handing out awards at the end. Those are easy stuff. The most important duty is to ensure that the reviews are done properly. With that said, if you would still like to see a precise evidence showing problematic reviews that're caught by coordinator(s), I'll be happy to show you. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:03, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Well I participated in the 2008 drive, (your ref 3), it does not appear to show that any reviews were checked. I participated in the 2009 drive (your ref 4): I did 20 reviews, so 4th highest number of reviews, none of mine were checked but some were. I did 58 reviews the 2nd highest number in the April 2010 drive (See 5), no reviews at all seemed to have checked. I also participated in the April 2011 drive (See 6) and from memory one participant was removed fom the list and some of those reviews were so bad they went to GAR - I reviewed at least one at GAR from that editor. Perhaps you can see where I am comming from? Pyrotec (talk) 16:03, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely. You raised a very good and valid point there. It seems like the recent drives' coordinators did minimal (if any) post-drive checks. I was one of the three coordinators for the July-August 2007 drive (ref 1). We did spot checks at a rate of 1 every 5 to 10 per person and if something catches our eyes we'll examine each review conducted by that individual. Do you think we should resume this practice at our next drive? OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 19:14, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

I can think of two big reasons I don't review many articles. The first is, I'm not willing to review things I know nothing about. I suppose one could look at the references and see that they are reputable publications and do back up what is being claimed, but I don't feel comfortable doing that. The other is that I some things are just too narrow to need an article, and thus no article on such a narrow topic can be good. The prime example is individual episodes of TV shows. Sure, the episode of the Ed Sullivan show featuring the first American appearance of the Beatles deserves an article, but normally, no. I don't think it would go over too well if I started failing individual episodes left and right, so I just let the sit there. Jc3s5h (talk) 20:55, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I also avoid pop culture articles, for the same reasons. I believe that most of these episodes fail WP:Notability for only receiving WP:Run-of-the-mill coverage in independent sources and therefore should be merged into season-length lists.

The number of nominations waiting for a reviewer is currently about 20% higher than last year's average, and it looks like pop culture is what's driving this. I don't know if that's really high enough to justify a formal drive. It's probably enough for each of us to think about picking up another article to review. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:04, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Does that "each of us" include you? Malleus Fatuorum 18:10, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Have you actually reviewed any articles? Malleus Fatuorum 20:42, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

How about a joint review, or reviews? LOL. Pyrotec (talk) 20:52, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

It gets my goat when someone who's never been in the trenches starts offering advice to those who have. Malleus Fatuorum 21:11, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, I suggest that WhatamIdoing starts reviewing before offering spurious advice. Jezhotwells (talk) 22:00, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

In the last three weeks, I have participated in three GA reviews, including one as a specifically requested second opinion. The last one that I reviewed on my own was Talk:Kent Cochrane/GA1, started in response to a request on this page and closed (not listed) a month ago. If you'd wanted to know more about my involvement, then Special:Contributions isn't very hard to find.

And, yes, I have been trying to decide which one I'd like to review next. I am most interested in reviewing medicine-related articles, but the fact is that there are currently zero such articles in need of a reviewer. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:33, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

My apologies, I didn't look back as far as June. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:58, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

What to do with GANs

A wikipedian has retied and has retired and he had some articals for GAN. What do we do with thease articals. Pedro J. ^{the rookie} 03:00, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Leave them in the queue. When they get reviewed, if the reviewers determine that the articles meet the GA criteria, they'll be listed. If they don't meet the criteria, the reviewers can decide to not list them, or to hold them. If no one steps up to make improvements during any hold period, they can be not listed after the reviewer ends the hold period. Imzadi 1979 → 03:12, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

You may add a note in the template, as in {{GA nominee|...|note=The nominator of this article has left wikipedia}}. I guess that this means the article should be either approved (it may be a good article as it is) or failed, without the option to put it on hold. Cambalachero (talk) 03:15, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

I'd say that if the articles are not passed, the relevant WPs should be informed so that other editors are aware of the situation. Someone may step in and make the necessary improvements. Mjroots (talk) 07:16, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

It would be better to warn wikiprojects before the review, when we know that an editor is no longer available, to see if someone offers to watch the nomination and adress potencial concerns (as the nominator would). Otherwise, putting the article on hold, waiting several days, and then closing, would be a waste of unneeded procedures; this should be done if we know that there's someone out there who will adress the problems. The fail closing would detail the problems with the article anyway, in case someone in the future wants to do something about them. Cambalachero (talk) 15:04, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

British European Airways Flight 548

I'm minded to review the British European Airways Flight 548 (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) GAN, but I've had some previous input to the article. Therefore I'm asking whether or not my input is significant enough to disqualify my as a reviewer. As it would be my first GAR, I would seek the assistance of a more experienced reviewer in any case. Mjroots (talk) 07:15, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, the question is "what is considered 'significant contributions'?", per reviewer criteria. Everyone seems to have a different opinion on what constitutes as "significant contributions". OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 20:18, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

The article's edit history shows my contributions. I feel that they are minor, but would welcome an outsite opinion. Mjroots (talk) 10:45, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Portia labiata/GA1 again

At Talk:Portia labiata/GA1 Binksternet says, "What must be taken out (of the lead): specifics on size, and specifics on color, markings and hairs. ... I believe it is not, that it is immediately overly-specific and thus dulls the reader's interest. If you wish this GAN to go forward with positive results then fix it." Please comment at the bottom of Talk:Portia labiata/GA1#Lead. I think the short description in the lead helps readers to identify this Portia species.--Philcha (talk) 19:37, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/My Only Wish (This Year) (2nd nomination)

This GA is currently at AfD. Here is the review page. The reviewer, however, retired. --Efe (talk) 12:29, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Boron group

Resolved

Boron group is in Biology, should be in Chemistry. --Ettrig (talk) 08:42, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

This has been fixed. Jezhotwells (talk) 18:12, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

My username is incorrect

Somehow the GA bot writes my username as Jaime1=070996 instead of Jaime070996 in WP:GAN#SPORT. Jaime070996 00:16, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

I can't figure out why - you should ask at User talk:harej, the talk page of the bot owner. Jezhotwells (talk) 18:14, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Grey's Anatomy review issue

I have an issue here. The article was put up for review, and within the hour a new user account passed it. I reverted it and was reverted back. I left a note on the talk page, which was reverted as well. The lack of listening went from me assuming a good faith new user to a potential sock, and would like someone else to look. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 18:47, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

I have restored all comments on his page. They will probably be removed again, so what's the point... The article has so many issues that he didn't raise, that it makes me wonder if he is being biased. I guess it's good not to bite him, though I would have ran out of patience as well. Do you have any evidence of him being a sock puppet though? —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 19:04, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Nope, I've just noticed that when a user's first edit is doing a review, it usually doesn't end well. He's blocked now though after clearly not listening to multiple people telling him to stop. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 19:05, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Article passed by AJona1992's sock

Techno Cumbia was listed as a good article on 13 August. The review, such as it was, was performed by the nominator. Checkuser has confirmed it and the SPI is waiting administration/closure. In the meantime, should this article go through WP:GAR or simply be removed from the GA list? --BelovedFreak 15:56, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

If the article fails to meet the criteria, it should be sent to GAR. If it passes muster no action needs to be taken. Jezhotwells (talk) 18:18, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Even if promoted by the nominator? Shouldnt it be at least returned to the queue to be reviewed by someone else? --BelovedFreak 19:08, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

In those cases the article should just be removed from the queue completely and the template removed as if it didn't happen. I used to think that we could put it back in the queue but that's giving too much faith to people who are gaming the system. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:50, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Diatribe
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I replied. You have no proof I was socking, how can I if I life in Hartford, CT and not in Florida and Stamford, CT you stupid bitch? True talk, you cry about this shit all the time get a fucking life. AJona1992 (talk) 16:10, 17 August 2011 (UTC) While adding your charming diatribe to the SPI, you may have missed the part where the checkuser confirmed that the two accounts are the same person.--BelovedFreak 16:16, 17 August 2011 (UTC) I don't get it at all, how are they the same? I don't live in Florida nor do I live in Stamford, Connecticut. I live in Hartford point blank. If you guys are going to block me for a proposed "sock" then go fuck yourselves. I have been expanding articles and had two GA articles, helped fight vandalism, helped removed two IPs who had gave threats to two other users, I've been helping Wikipedia. So now you want to cry and bitch about how you "believe" that I am socking. Bitch get a fucking life, AJona1992 (talk) 16:26, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Nominator withdrawing an article

The nominator of Julia Gillard wishes to withdraw their good article nomination. Should it be marked as a quick fail or is there a way to withdraw it without failing the article. AIRcorn (talk) 04:34, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

It'll probably have to be marked as failed since there's noted stability issues. Either way removing from the queue's pretty easy. Getting sick and tired of all these system gamers popping up lately... Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 04:49, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Technically, all articles are either "listed" or "not listed" rather than "passed" and "failed". "Not listed" is the right outcome for withdrawn noms (assuming someone has started the review). WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:39, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Abandoned review

Could someone take a look at Talk:Havørn Accident/GA1. The reviewer seems to have abandoned the review. I have ensured that all his comments have been seen to. Arsenikk ^(talk) 12:24, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Closed, edits after note left shows clear abandonment. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:51, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Reporting two bad reviews

I just noticed that a new editor passed his own nomination of Muhammad Syukri Ridwan, which clearly does not meet the criteria (this footballer has never played professionally and is thus not notable). This came two days after my nomination of Xiaxue was failed with reasons such as "needs more content to pass" and "one picture, a GA needs more". Please deal with these accordingly. Thanks. --J.L.W.S. The Special One (talk) 15:44, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I initiated a community reassessment of Muhammad Syukri Ridwan, though I should think that a quick administrative reversion of the GA listing would be faster with less community time wasted.

I don't know what to say about your disappointing result at Xiaxue—there were useful suggestions offered by the reviewer. Binksternet (talk) 16:37, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

The review of Xiaxue is wrong on policy and nearly useless in content. The editor who did it should be discouraged from doing GA reviews, and the article should be allowed to be renominated and placed in the queue where it would have been if no review had taken place. Looie496 (talk) 16:51, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I deleted the passed article and reverted the Xiaxue close a couple days ago after trouting the reviewer. Seeing too much of this crap recently. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:24, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I smell socks. Look at Faizilcool's contribution and DeltaShield's contribution OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 17:26, 26 August 2011 (UTC

Thanks for promptly dealing with the article about the non-notable footballer. Before renominating Xiaxue, I would like to ask which section would be most suitable; "Culture and society" (where I initially placed it) or "Computing"? Also, which section would be most suitable for an article about a non-profit organisation that supports people with special needs? --J.L.W.S. The Special One (talk) 16:56, 26 August 2011 (UTC))

I would say that culture and society, where the article currently is, is probably best. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:14, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Identifying Socks/Inexperienced Reviewers

Judging from the comments trending above there seems to be an increase in people gaming the system as well as the usual number of inexperienced editors struggling with the criteria. While a moderator might be a solution, a more practical approach could be the use of a bot to automatically keep track of reviewers and the number of reviews they have done. If something could be added to the Wikipedia:Good article nominations/Report (envision something like the Nominators with multiple nominations section with the reviewer name, number of reviews and links to open/recently closed reviews listed) then interested/experienced GA reviewers could easily identify and keep an eye on reviews conducted by inexperienced editors. If the review is satisfactory nothing needs to be done (or a note could be given thanking them and offering help in the future), if there are minor mistakes they could be pointed out and if it is completely rubbish then it could be dealt with easier. Some rough guidelines on how to handle bad reviews could also be useful - when to take it to GAR, when to just revert. AIRcorn (talk) 20:14, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

I like this idea. It's more workable, more flexible, and less bite-y than other options.

I suspect that this problem has a lot to do with the beginning of the school year. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:40, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

You need to stop being soft; the happiness of nominators is not the most important thing. Malleus Fatuorum 22:55, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

No, taking care of crappy reviews certainly is up there though, so I'm in agreement with the above. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 02:13, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

I don't see the relevance of Malleus' comment. Making a short list of inexperienced reviewers, to aid our surveillance efforts, does not seem like a sign of "being soft" or making noms happy. In fact, since new reviewers tend to be lax, focusing our attention on these reviewers' work is likely to make some noms unhappy. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:31, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

It's a step in the right direction. --Rschen7754 22:56, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

The more info the bot could give us, the better. Of course, I don't have to write the code for the bot. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:18, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Minimum requirements for reviewers?

I was just about to come here and post a message about the Grey's Anatomy review, but Wizardman beat me to it, above. On a related note, is it time to put some kind of minimum standard on GA reviewers? I believe this has been discussed before and I know that the general feeling is that we want to keep the process light-weight without unnecessary bureaucracy. I'm not talking about preventing inadequate reviews, which would be quite difficult to do, I'm talking specifically about some measure that reduces the temptation for nominators to create a sock that passes their own article. I have seen this happen now with Gabi Hernandez, Ajona1992, and now possibly this Grey's Anatomy one. That's only three, but they're just ones that I've happened to notice - the first two because I was already familiar with the editors in question. I haven't gone looking for suspicious reviews, so who knows what has slipped through.

I know people are usually reluctant to implement "solutions looking for problems", and quite rightly. I believe this is a problem though. Editors eager to get their articles passed are able to undermine the process because of the "any logged in editor can review" rule. Can we not set some minimum standard for first-time reviewers? The first sock mentioned above was involved in more than the GA process, so may have still slipped through, but the other two should have been preventable. Any thoughts? --BelovedFreak 19:06, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

How about a mainspace edit count? They can only make a certian number of bad faith edits before getting blocked. —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 19:08, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

So, how would this work? Who would count the edits and certify a reviewer as OK? Jezhotwells (talk) 23:04, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

I think requiring autoconfirmed status would probably be enough to prevent any casual sockpuppetry or well-meaning but under-informed new users (the "I don't know Wikipedia standards but I'm going to pass articles anyway" kind), but I don't know how that could be enforced, since the reviews and promotions are done at individual articles. —Darkwind (talk) 04:29, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Maybe this is a little steep, but what about 6 months and 4,000 edits? I'm willing to accept a higher limit. I agree that some reviewers are just simply too inexperienced when it comes down to it.--CallMeNathan • Talk2Me 04:32, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

But how could that be enforced? FA has a number of delegates responsible for the process. All GA has has is a number of dickheads who think they know better than the reviewers. Malleus Fatuorum 04:39, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

I encountered a similar situation recently at Talk:Julia Gillard/GA1. Limiting to autoconfirmed users would have worked in this instance. If it is possible to only allow autoconfirmed users create the review page I think that would be the way to go. AIRcorn (talk) 04:49, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Obviously one problem for enforcing a new rule is that there is no GA director or equivalent. I was thinking of something we could add to the "how to review an article" section at WP:GAN where it says "that only registered users may review articles—make sure you are logged in", we could have "that only registered users with X number of edits may review articles—make sure you are logged in". I was actually thinking of a much lower number of edits, purely aimed at discouraging nominators that may be tempted to create a sock just for this purpose (inexperienced reviewers is a separate issue). The system would still be gameable, but hopefully it would reduce these incidents. In the absence of someone running the show, it would be enforceable by any other editor who spots someone reviewing with less than X number of edits. They could simply drop a note to the reviewer explaining the rule, delete the review (or tag for deletion), and return it to the queue. A little extra work, but hopefully drama-free. Not fool-proof by any means.

Personally, my heart sinks a little when I see these situations because there doesn't seem to be a consensus on how to deal with it. Wizardman and Eagles247 dealt with the Grey's Anatomy reiew by just removing it. A couple of sections above, Jezhotwells suggests taking such an article to GAR only if there are obvious isses with the article, regardless of whether or not the reviewer was a sock of the nominator. If nothing else, it would be nice to have consensus on how to deal with the situation. --BelovedFreak 11:22, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

I personally love your idea BelovedFreak. Plus I would suggest the establishment of a moderator, who would review the capability/edits of the reviewer of an article, and then only allow hiim/her to review it. How does that sound? — Legolas ^(talk2me) 12:25, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Maybe we do need one. I'm seeing a LOT of problems the past week or so, and having someone who's job is to keep an eye out could reduce stress big time. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 22:08, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

How about having moderators per subtopic? I know that the music, films and sports section get the most traffic. So if we have three moderators, we can distribute them amongst these three subtopic + add the less-traffic subtopics for them too. — Legolas ^(talk2me) 02:55, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Do you think anyone would want such a role? For this specific problem, a formal prohibition of brand new editors performing reviews could probably be overseen (perhaps imperfectly) just by anyone else involved in GA.--BelovedFreak 08:49, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

The moderator idea might sound good as long as s/he does not have too many buttons to play with. Choosing one for the respective subtopics will be difficult, though and as BelovedFreak said, the noob editors won't even know of such formalities. —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 09:23, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, I definitely think change is needed. As for a moderator, I'm all for it, but there have to be some sort of guideline/rule. I don't think it will be fair if the moderator is a regular GA contributor, just simply someone who is familiar with the criteria. The person(s) need(s) to be someone who we can all agree on. Any volunteers?--CallMeNathan • Talk2Me 09:34, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

As someone who has done about 450 GAN reviews & GAN Sweeps in some three years (and there is a reviewer who has a "500 award") I would not look kindly on a moderator, who I suspect is likely to have done less GAN reviews than me, moderating my reviews. Neither would I want that job. I once reviewed 58 GAN reviews in one month at GAN backlogs and burnt out for several months afterwards; however, one other editor has done 91 and 94 reviews in one month in the 2010 and 2011 GAN backlogs, respectively. On my experience, I suggest that the workload would be too high for a single moderator on an on-going month by month basis. I have to admit, I tend to "cherry-pick": I seldom do sports nominations, pop stars, or TV shows because I find them (mostly) boring to review and "medical"/Biological nominations since I don't have adequate experience. The Moderator would not have that option, every review has to be reviewed and it has to be done continuously. Pyrotec (talk) 20:26, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

To add a "follow on" to my own comment stating that I don't think a Moderator is achievable at GAN - I suggest that those in favour look at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Good_articles/Project_quality_task_force/Sweeps/Running_total. That gives the time and effort: three years and 52 reviewers, that it took to moderate 2,800 existing articles that had been awarded GA-status prior to 2007. Looking at Wikipedia:Good_article_statistics, about 3,000 GAs were awarded in the twelve months between 1st August 2010 and 1st August 2011 and that figure is slightly larger than GA Sweeps. Pyrotec (talk) 20:56, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

Just to clarify, my original comment/suggestion was not about having a moderator, but trying to implement something to discourage socking to get their nominations through, or at the very least, a firmer written guideline for the rest of us on how to deal with it when it happens. I can't be sure, but I believe later suggestions in this thread for a moderator were to do with looking only at reviews performed new reviewers. I agree that one moderator could not oversee all reviews, not by a long shot, and as I recall that kind of all-encompassing moderation for GA has not found favour in past discussions anyway. --BelovedFreak 21:05, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. You and I seem to be in agreement. A moderator to review every GAN review is not realistic; but also we don't want nominators abusing the nomination process and/or inexperienced users passing/failing nominations on the basis of personal points of view. Pyrotec (talk) 21:23, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

How to delist?

I was looking at Green Wing, and I don't think it passes GAR anymore. What's the easiest way to delist it? Thanks. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:02, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Good article reassessment. You can either perform an individual reassessment on it (much like a GA review; instructions are on that page) or you can request a community reassessment.--BelovedFreak 08:53, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

It seems like you used to be able to just change the GA field to a B or whatever, with an edit summary of why. It sounds like we're requiring a mini review to demote old articles now. Is that right? If it is, I liked the lightweight process we used to have. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 04:22, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

That seems a bit too lightweight. A GA process is significant work for everybody involved; it ought not to be possible to undo it with nothing more than an edit summary. Looie496 (talk) 05:13, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

It depends. For newer GAs, it may be too agressive to just demote. There are editors who care about the GA status of the article. For some of the ones passed years ago, no one who cares is around anymore. Then, making a big checklist for editors who haven't edited in 2 years is a bit silly. This is the same problem that FA has always had. You can look at all the FAs from pre 2008, and they don't pass muster, but it's too troublesome to go through the process to delist. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 01:25, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

Query on sources...

A quick question. I'm reviewing an article at the moment which relies on a relatively small number of books for its references (one in particular is used for the majority of the references). A second editor has - helpfully and in good faith - noted a concern that there is a wider corpus of work on the subject that could be cited in the article. Both the original editor putting the article forward for review and the second editor agree that the article as it stands is accurate and is not necessarily missing any key points (i.e. it is broad in its coverage and verifiable). What I wanted to check, however, was whether there is any official GA requirement for an article to draw on a wide corpus of work in its references? I can't find anything stating that it is a formal requirement but was keen to check my understanding of this with the community. Hchc2009 (talk) 09:00, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

It's tough to say, since there's not really a requirement on that. If one source is able to make it so that all GA criteria is satisfied, then it is, and in some cases there may be just one major source on something. Having said that, using multiple book sources in an article if possible is rarely a bad thing, and should definitely be encouraged. I could see FA perhaps being uncomfortable that it's using just one source, but as long as the source isn't blatantly POV or missing any obvious points, then I think it's ok. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:14, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Cheers - that was my feeling too, but it's the first time I've had this particular issue come up at GA and a second opinion's no bad thing. Thanks, Hchc2009 (talk) 17:06, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

FA would definitely be against it. One of it's criteria is the following: "well-researched: it is a thorough and representative survey of the relevant literature. Claims are verifiable against high-quality reliable sources and are supported by inline citations where appropriate". GA, on the other hand, only requires that "[the article provide] references to all sources of information in the section(s) dedicated to the attribution of these sources". NW (Talk) 18:22, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

Mayo Foundation v. United States abandoned by reviewer

Don4of4 (talk · contribs) very graciously agreed to review my GA nomination of Mayo Foundation v. United States on 22 August, just 8 hours (!) after I nominated it. I contacted him later that day to thank him for agreeing to take up the review and to offer my assistance in obtaining the non-online sources if he required them, which he did not acknowledge. He has not edited since 25 August. Am I being impatient, or is there something more I could be doing? NW (Talk) 16:52, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

He's tagged several articles but hasn't started up any of them, it seems. I'd wait another couple days, and if he doesn't start any I can get rid of them. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 16:55, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

Still no response unfortunately. If you are up to it, I would definitely appreciate you taking over the review. NW (Talk) 17:26, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Rm'd the three tags and put them back in the queue. I might get to yours soon, since it's only been a couple weeks since it was nom'd though, I'd rather tackle the articles waiting since June first. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:10, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Sounds good. NW (Talk) 17:07, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Requesting second opinion

As I tried to fix something that ends up broken due to the template, but the bot removed it: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen needs a second opinion. The current review is not as in-depth as necessary (just the fact that the reviewer mentions "Everything has reliable references" while I as an editor am still working on removing fansites shows it all). If anyone steps in, thanks. igordebraga ≠ 01:14, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Editor has closed the review because he says the article was unstable, when there've been no edit wars... only vandalism that was reverted... I'm confused as to why people who don't know what a good article is are reviewing good articles. 94.8.98.105 (talk) 17:35, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Mass delisting by User:Northamerica1000

See also: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents § User:Northamerica1000

Could someone please take a look at the mass delisting of GA articles Northamerica1000 (talk · contribs) is initiating? It appears to be highly disruptive. Viriditas (talk) 13:10, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Template:GAN/preload

Recent changes to this template have had the effect of removing the start date of the review, also adding a lot of irrelevant stuff about the reviewwer - can we not just go back to how it was? Jezhotwells (talk) 19:48, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Agreed - If it ain't broke, don't fix it. --Eisfbnore • talk 20:03, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

After some modifations I managed to make it passable for now, I think. I'm not opposed to a full revert if that's decided though. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 01:35, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Glitched symbol in tables

I was using {{GATable}} to review an article today, but as you can see at Talk:Power dividers and directional couplers/GA2, the on hold symbol isn't loading correctly. I haven't been able to find the problem. Could someone more experienced with templates help me? Thanks, Nathan2055^{talk - review} 18:02, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Fixed; the on hold part apparently has to be two words. I'd add in onhold to the template to avoid that problem again but not sure how. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 18:07, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

Four articles I need someone to take over

Hey everybody. Due to personal reasons, I have to unfortunately leave Wikipedia for a full month starting tonight. I will therefore need someone to take over four reviews that I have begun. They are The Drug in Me Is You, "1+1 (song)", Jessica Mauboy and "Good Enough (Evanescence song)". Thanks to all :)--CallMeNathan • Talk2Me 02:01, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Rude Boy (song)/GA1

Here we have another case of a white-wash review. The page was created and passed exactly at 3:14 timestamp. And there are three editors who have pointed out obvious issues with the article at my talk page. Music articles are getting so finnicky. Do we need to take this to GAR or can we delete the review and start afresh? — Legolas ^(talk2me) 10:02, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

First thing i want to make clear is that Calvin (nominator) is my friend, in fact he is a very good friend of mine. But here, i totally agree with Legolas (who is also my friend). This has been going on for too long now. I do not appreciate articles getting crap reviews like this. Jivesh • Talk2Me 10:22, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

First of all I am not involved with music articles, but if you both agree it does not meet the GA criteria you can demote it, leaving a comment on the talk page of what needs doing.Jim Sweeney (talk) 10:36, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

(ec) Is it just me or does that article consists mostly of copy/pasted (though I guess "properly" quoted and attributed) statements from music review websites (some of dubious reliability). Here it repeats 41 words verbatim from one source [19]. Now, that part is a quote (and given as such), but still, that ain't "greatly written", it's "greatly copy/pasted". The second match in that report, the 11 word one is also verbatim from the source and this time it isn't given as a quote. This source provided strings of 31, 22, 14 quotations for the article [20]. Again, they're attributed and put in quotes, so it ain't copyvio or plagiarism, strictly speaking - but please don't tell me that it's an encyclopedic article either. It's a collection of quotes made on other websites. It ain't GA. Delist it.

I'm not even going to bitch about the fact that the article doesn't even bother explaining what a Rude Boy is (I'm guessing the author, like many of these people writing the music reviews, has no idea).Volunteer Marek (talk) 10:40, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Well I think we know the fate of this article now. Delist and reassess. —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 10:49, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

This just in. A Copyscape search for this article reveals over 30 plagiarism notations afflicted by such copy-paste I guess. Ya, delist. — Legolas ^(talk2me) 11:53, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Clearly there's a subtle conflict of interest here. The reviewer recognized himself as a Rihanna fan. While's there's nothing wrong with that, it can be gleaned that passing "Rude Boy" without going into the process as required by GAN is indication that there's a COI. Going into the process because clearly the article has lots of issues. And surprisingly the reviewer failed to see that. He is (and perhaps was) a "thorough" reviewer at GAN. I agree with Sweeney; Legolas you may do the honor. Thanks. --Efe (talk) 11:57, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Mark. Guys, I have notified the nominator of the article. I will proceed after I hear his viewpoint on this matter. — Legolas ^(talk2me) 11:59, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Should we notify the reviewer? —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 12:00, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Already did. — Legolas ^(talk2me) 12:14, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

I was surprised to see that that the only issue was a few date inconsistencies, because I know it wasn't absolute perfection, so I don't have a problem with it being re-reviewed (I'd actually prefer it to be), but it should be re-nominated and put back into the GAN list where it originally was, as I nominated it nearly 4 weeks ago and have waited patiently like everyone else. I've seen it before in the list where a note has been put on the review saying that the article was unfairly reviewed etc. Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 12:25, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Not before you deal with the plagiarism of course. Good to see everyone come to agreement. —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 12:33, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

What plagiarism? Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 12:36, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Read the full discussion. —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 12:37, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

I've looked on the link but I don't see plagiarism. How are quotes with the reviewer's names included classed as plagiarism? Vast majority of them are completely co-incidental and don't even relate to each other in the same context. For example, "the best of rihanna's work thus far as it stands rude boy is an icy distant groove that you can sing along to but" and "eriksen and hermansen under their production name stargate and swire rude boy is an up tempo song which draws heavy influence from dancehall pop". How do those two relate? How else am I mean't to phrase "Rude Boy is an". Vast majority of music article use this, it's not plagiarism. Also, "the new york times company", I don't get how listing the newspaper in the prose is plagiarism? You're mean't to list it. If it is, then every article which uses it is also plagiarising. Oh, and "rated r review of the rihanna album rated r rihanna good girl gone bad rihanna featuring drake what's my name review of the what's" and "of her island pop beginnings the effortless hitmaking of the good girl gone bad era and the more menacing persona she's unveiled post grammygate". So listing the name of an album is also plagiarising? I actually think each and every one of those is complete BS, sorry, but it is. Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 12:49, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

I thought the GA review was closed? [21] --Efe (talk) 12:59, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

What do you mean? The whole point of this discussion is to reach a decision as to whether or not (though it's clearly a 'not') the article should be kept as a GA. Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 13:03, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

That was already closed Calvin. A second review is underway. Regardless, I don't think that's not just the issue. --Efe (talk) 13:08, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Where is this second GAN review?? Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 13:12, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

If you would care to read the discussion, a second review has been proposed and we are waiting for the reviewer to comment, although consensus here itself dictates a delist. It's clear from the link that Efe posted that initially you were just happy that the article passed. Then after being notified of this discussion, you went and modified your comment to make it appear as if you knew there were issues with the article. — Legolas ^(talk2me) 13:15, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

I have read it, and I know that one is being proposed, but Efe's phrasing made it sound like one had already been created. "a second review is underway" reads like one has already been created. And Legolas, I'm not stupid, I knew the page would be on your watchlist and that you would be checking, I thought my most recent comment anyway, wouldn't you? Though I highly doubt you would believe me. Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 13:31, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

I read the article. Nothing didn't match the good article criteria. I listed two issues and I believe it deserves GA status. If people feel it isn't then I suppose you could reassess which I find questionable since I reviewed it and it meets criteria. TRLIJC19 (talk) 17:47, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

A review is looking through the article and listed any errors it may have. This one has plenty, and you listed 1. You are obviously inexperienced with the process, but this is merely unacceptable. — Status {^talk_contribs  18:04, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Actually I couldn't see any major problems. Feel free to reassess. TRLIJC19 (talk) 18:07, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Like I said before, it's not really "plagiarism" since most of the copied text is attributed and in quotes. It's more that the article is not really "written" but rather just strings together verbatim quotes from other websites.Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:57, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

At a glance, I don't see any plagiarism (which is a high charge on WP). The "Critical reception" has too much quoting, and not enough summarizing. That should be reviewed. The article looks pretty good, and with a slightly harsher critique, it can probably make a good GA. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 01:01, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Know nothing about GA processes, however an editor with only 750 edits and less than 450 in article space does not seem well qualified to assess any article. Mtking ^(edits) 07:22, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

How you get 750? I only see 331 [22]. Not that that's a real difference. Volunteer Marek  15:39, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

He was TRLIJC18 before he was TRLIJC19. Mtking ^(edits) 23:43, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Oh. Is there a TRLIJC17?  Volunteer Marek  07:27, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

No. —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 21:49, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Inexperienced reviewer needs monitoring and mentoring

On 23 August 2011, Plarem failed my nomination of Xiaxue, but his ridiculous review (which included reasons such as "One picture. A Good Article needs more.") was reverted by Wizardman. Two days ago, he failed the same article again, but this time, he raised several valid concerns (a poor image caption, overlinking and lack of a date of birth). I replied to his second review with a friendly note, saying that I would work on the article and suggesting that he learn more about GA reviewing, then nominated another article, Pathlight School.

To my surprise, Plarem reviewed that article several hours ago, placing the nomination on hold. Some of his concerns were valid, but some were rather dubious. He also replied to my friendly note with "PLEASE have the article go through C-Class and B-Class before it is nominated again. You cannot skip C and B class before you go to GA standards." Having written seven GAs, I know that is not how Wikipedia assessment works. That he reviewed a second, two-day-old nomination by me, when there are plenty of older nominations by other nominators, also raises suspicions.

Could an experienced reviewer, or two, please mentor and monitor him? He seems to be acting in good faith and has the potential to be a good reviewer. However, he needs guidance, and nominators should not have to suffer due to his mistakes.

--J.L.W.S. The Special One (talk) 11:45, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

As much as I'd like to take the pass and run, I don't feel that the 2nd opinion on Talk:Spanish Civil War/GA1 was handled correctly. However, in this instance the first review was in line with what I'd expect, except that the reviewer could not complete it due to a clarification of his topic ban. So I'm not necessarily opposed to its passing, only that I think I should mention it in relation to this user. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 14:04, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

I have placed a note on that editors talk page. I am also adding a second opinion to a review of one of the two WP:GANs submitted by that editor. He appears to be questioning the neutrality of that review. As I will not be active for much of the rest of this month and I have two GAN review On Hold that is about as much as I can do in September. Pyrotec (talk) 20:30, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

We should guide him, not bite him, but what should be done regarding his review of Pathlight School? --J.L.W.S. The Special One (talk) 07:23, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Well it's On Hold. You or anyone else could fix it as requested in the /GA1; approaches could be made to the reviewer to reconsider some or all of the stated "corrective actions" in /GA1; a second opinion be requested by the nominator and/or the reviewer; if it is failed because the reviewer considers the corrective actions to be insufficient you (as nominator) could take it to WP:GAR, and/or any editor who considers the final decision (none has been made) to be wrong can use WP:GAR to re-review it against WP:WIAGA. None of these involve any biting and are therefore user-friendly. Pyrotec (talk) 11:02, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Review appears to accidently started

The initiation of rugby union review appears to be a good faith comment, not a review. It has been started by an unregistered user so is technically invalid anyway. Could someone please delete it so it does not lose its place in the queue (I have moved the comment to the talk page). AIRcorn (talk) 02:00, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

Removed. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 03:03, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

Article not listing properly

Why isn't Junior Hemingway listing at WP:GAC?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:01, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

It is. Malleus Fatuorum 17:15, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

Has article been to GAN?

How do find out if an article has ever been to WP:GAN, and what the outcome was? There doesn't seem to be an archives link on the main page. --Redrose64 (talk) 16:38, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

If it's been through GA in the past few years, there'll almost certainly be a talk subpage with the review; failing that, there should be a review in the talkpage history. Shimgray | talk | 16:40, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks; this means that my downgradings here and here were justified. --Redrose64 (talk) 18:21, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Retired? Or actually not.

I noticed that there are a couple of nominators listed as being retired, however looking at their contribs they seem to be still contributing to the project. I thought I'd flag it in case there was a bot that's gone haywire. I'm looking specifically at MayhemMario (talk · contribs) and Adabow (talk · contribs) who are listed as retired in the Theatre, film and drama section. --Deadly∀ssassin 09:21, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Given the fact they are not only editing, but the fact that I reviewed one and had it responded to, I removed the notes. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:25, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Get a specific article to GA status

There is a specific article I would like to get to GA status. I would like to get a review of what issues specifically need to be addressed for that article to pass GA review. At the help desk I was told that I should ask here. So should I simply list the article here at the project page? Toshio Yamaguchi (talk) 09:00, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

The specific criteria used to list articles as GAs are at Wikipedia:Good article criteria#What is a good article.3F. You can also take a look at articles on similar topics already listed at WP:GA and compare the article you want to nominate to see if it's a similar standard. If you're confident the article meets the criteria, then you can list it for a review. If you're not sure yet, you can request a peer review for the article, stating that you wish to take it to GA, and someone will be able to give you some in depth advice/criticism. Also, I'm not sure which article you're thinking of, but if it's a list, it won't be listed as a good article, so would need to be nominated at WP:FLC instead. --BelovedFreak 10:22, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. I will go through the article myself first and check for compliance with all points at WP:WIAGA#What is a good article? and then perhaps list it at WP:GAN. Toshio Yamaguchi (talk) 10:45, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

If the article is worked on by multiple editors, it would be a good idea to ask for comments on the article's talk page before nominating it. Looie496 (talk) 14:43, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

GAN page problem

I've noticed that in any recent reviews, any time a review tag is added, it ends with {{toolbar|separator=dot rather than the date. From the looks of it, the toolbar template is broken, but I can't figure out how to fix it. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 16:00, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

It all worked fairly well until all the recent changes - can't we just revert back? Jezhotwells (talk) 20:18, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

For instance, the GAN report now lists most reviews as broken. Jezhotwells (talk) 20:32, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

The fix that caused the mess has now been reverted at least. Not sure why all these template modifications are popping up lately. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 23:13, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

Page needs deleting

Could an admin please delete Talk:Revolution Software/GA1 and Revolution Software/GA1 (created by the GA nominator). --BelovedFreak 20:16, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

I have put CSD tags - G8 - on both pages. Jezhotwells (talk) 20:41, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Cheers, I always forget that option. --BelovedFreak 20:48, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Mass new music articles from User:Drewcifer

I looked over the mass nominations of User:Drewcifer's articles. Most, if not all, pertaining to the band Nine Inch Nails. Most, if not all, the articles are no where near B-Class and some even have {{citation needed}} tags. Just a note here for reviewers. Best, Jonayo! ^{Selena 4 ever} 18:28, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Seeing how it was not Drewcifer, but an IP (Drewcifer hasn't edited in some time, it seems), I just blanket reverted it after looking at a few and noticing that they were not even close to ready. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 19:15, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

6 minute review

Talk:Michael Jordan statue/GA1. 6 minute review? Jezhotwells (talk) 21:58, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

I read through the article thoroughly and was checking the sources before I even created the GA1 subpage for the article. 6 minutes only reflects the edits I made from when I created the subpage to when I put in the review, not how much effort I put into it. If I were to estimate, I would guess I spent about 40 minutes on it. --Tea with toast (話) 22:15, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

I apologise, in my experience the subpage is created at the start of the review, which indicates that the page is under review - and stops someone else from starting a duplicate review. IMHO, it would also be good to comment on how an article meets the criteria, apart from just ticking the boxes. Jezhotwells (talk) 22:38, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

It's not necessary to use the template, and I for one never do. It's absurd to suggest that a reviewer needs to comment on how an article meets the criteria as opposed to how it doesn't. Malleus Fatuorum 22:52, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree with you, Jezhotwells, that the subpage should be created at the start of the review. Normally, that is also how I do things, but I forgot with this review. I understand that you're just doing some quality assurance and trying to make sure that GA reviews are being done properly, and I appreciate that. --Tea with toast (話) 04:30, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

No problems - I think Malleus missed the bit on the note on how to review an article that say: "Where the article meets the Good article criteria, explain why, and give suggestions for further improvements if appropriate." Jezhotwells (talk) 20:16, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

I take a different approach. I only review articles that I know something about, whether from professional work or personal reading. I then read the article and see if I am convinced that the article is substantially correct. If there are many claims that I have no idea about, they are cited to books that are not readily available to me, and I can't easily find other sources that back up the more important claims, then I make no related edits to Wikipedia and leave the article for someone else to review. I realize I could just see if each non-obvious claim has a citation, and that the citation appears superficially to be a reliable source, but I choose not to take that approach. Jc3s5h (talk) 19:07, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

In reply to Jezhotwells I missed nothing, I simply disagree with it. It is absurd to explain how an article meets the criteria as opposed to how it doesn't, and pretty little icons on a template are of no use to either man or beast, and certainly don't explain anything. For instance, when I review an article and look at image licensing I don't tick a little box to say I've done that, as it ought to be obvious that every reviewer checks against all of the GA criteria; I only flag up an issue if I'm concerned about a particular image. Similarly, I don't specify which sections I think meet the GA prose requirement, I only flag up those I think don't. Malleus Fatuorum 02:11, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Is the shooting down of one aircraft during the Vietnam war notable? Does it justify GA status?

User:Canpark has written an article Action of 7 May 1968 which relates to the shooting down by the North Vietnamese of 1 US aircraft during the Vietnam War. This article was assessed and passed for GA by User:SCB '92. I have questioned whether this event is notable particularly as the operative part of the article seems to be drawn from 1 page of one book. User:Canpark has also written another article Action of 16 June 1968 which essentially repeats all of Action of 7 May 1968 in order to recount a story of the shooting down by the North Vietnamese of 1 US aircraft. User:Canpark seems to be writing articles in order to transcribe the book by Topcerzer of Mig kills of the Vietnam war. Are these individual events notable and/or worthy of GA? Mztourist (talk) 13:12, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Notability is not a criteria for GA (or FA) status, so yes, such an article is worthy of GA. Whether this specific battle is notable for the purposes of having an article is not something I can say. That question might be better put to the military history project. It may be that these low level engagements are notable, or it may be that a merge of several such articles could be a benefit. Resolute 13:37, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

the issue is being discussed on the Military History talk page, I raised it here for completeness. regards Mztourist (talk) 13:56, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

You may want to provide a link to the other discussion. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 18:04, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

The discussion is here. Jezhotwells (talk) 01:49, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Three months

I'm seeing a good deal of articles waiting 2.5 months for a review while an influx of articles getting reviewed in 24 hours. Can we start knocking down the old side of the queue? Not fair to those who have been waiting. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:31, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Feel free. Malleus Fatuorum 15:39, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I do. Can't take them all on myself, alas, I'm not that good. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:40, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

There's often a reason why articles languish for two or three months, which is that for whatever reason it's not going to be fun to review them. Malleus Fatuorum 15:44, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Agree with Malleus - and Malleus and I agree about 1 topic. --Philcha (talk) 15:56, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I think many of the articles which wait a long time are about subjects of slight notability, e.g. songs which have charted on the basis of very few sales as compared to the days of vinyl, minor soap characters, episodes of tv series, wrestlers, etc where the sources are of best dubious reliability. When I have reviewed these, I have often met with hostility and unpleasant comments from teenage nominators with no comprehension of how to write good plain English. Consequently, I couldn't care less whether they wait 50 years to be reviewed. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:34, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

That's not always the case! Jaguar (talk) 17:45, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

No indeed it isn't. You and I have succeeded in working together pretty amicably in the past. Malleus Fatuorum 18:03, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, not all of us are immature or mindless; some of us want to graduate and get a good job. Jaguar (talk) 18:08, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Jaguar's right. For instance, the article Tin was placed on hold after 16 days of waiting for a reviewer, then forgotten about by the reviewer until 1 month and 9 days later, when somebody finally noticed that the reviewer wasn't reviewing the article anymore. Another 16 days on, and it's still on hold. Total waiting time: 2 months and 10 days. Result: On hold. And the nominator doesn't seen to be very interested, either. If what Jezhotwells said was true, then tin would be as about as important as this article, for instance! Thanks, GoldRock23^{(talk - my page - contribs)} 18:10, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Also, Jaguar said exactly my words. We're not all idiots - you know, some of us want to get somewhere and maybe even (gasp) go to university! Thanks, GoldRock23^{(talk - my page - contribs)} 18:24, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes he does, but so does Jezhotwells. Some of us have been to university, and to be abused by ignorant kids who can hardly string a sentence together just because you are critical of their GA nominations is not an experience many of us would seek out. Malleus Fatuorum 18:28, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I didn't say that all teenage nominators have no comprehension of how to write good plain English, but I have certainly come across some. Not to mention those who have told me they wouldn't waste bus fare on going to a library to seek out references. I also didn't say all of the articles that have to wait are in the "pop" culture categories, I said many. I would have reviewed Tin, but someone else got to it. A lot of nominators of all ages seek to write good articles on a wide range of topics, but I am rather discouraged by some in the popular culture fields who churn out rather bad articles and don't like being told so. Jezhotwells (talk) 22:43, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Maybe time for another backlog drive? Buggie111 (talk) 02:36, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

The problem is that you need to find reviewers willing to look at the endless stream of pop culture ephemera. If you ignore all the pop culture stuff then there's hardly any backlog at all. Malleus Fatuorum 02:47, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Coordinated Universal Time

I would like to pick up the review of this article, which was abandoned by the previous reviewer -- I have already started by adding comments to Talk:Coordinated Universal Time/GA1. I'm not sure of the proper way to let the bot know that I am reviewing it, though. (For what it's worth, I am aware that there has been some weirdness, but I'm not worried about it at this point.) Looie496 (talk) 17:06, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Best bet is to move the comments to /GA2, which would re-start the review and let the bot know. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:57, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Do I have to fail GA1 to do that, or can I just create GA2? Looie496 (talk) 22:30, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

You have to fail GA1. Malleus Fatuorum 22:39, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for picking up that abandoned review. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:48, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Aniru Conteh

I am ill and cannot continue with "Aniru Conteh". --Philcha (talk) 18:17, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

:Sorry to hear that. I'll take over the review if you like and User:Viriditas doesn't object. Malleus Fatuorum 18:27, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I think Malleus has pulled out for other reasons. Please, can some help. --Philcha (talk) 14:00, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Dealing with disruptive editing

I've opened a discussion on whether/how to change the process with which WP deals with disruptive editors. All input/ideas are welcome - I'd love it if we could develop some proposals to put to the broader community. Karanacs (talk) 19:00, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Why... um... is this being posted here?  Volunteer Marek  00:04, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Because the discussing is based mainly around how to allow editors to better focus on writing content, with less disruption from POV-pushers, people trying to use non-reliable sources, etc. Since people who participate in the GA process often focus their wiki-activities on writing/improving content, it seems that notifying them of a discussion regarding content contributors is polite, at the very least. Dana boomer (talk) 02:25, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Aren't these issues mostly relevant to editing Wikipedia in general? I'm not seeing anything in that discussion that is specifically relevant to GA.  Volunteer Marek  03:10, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Not specifically to GA, but since GA is a place where a lot of content writers congregate, it would seem that this would be a good place to notify a lot of them with one post... Dana boomer (talk) 15:04, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Three month backlog: incentives?

I notice there is a 3 month backlog in GAC (although it seems to vary widely between the various topic areas). Is that about average? or has it gotten larger lately? Has there ever been a discussion of processes to incentivize editors to perform GA reviews? For example, the Copy Editing guild awards barnstars for doing significant amounts of work; and DYK has a "quid pro quo" requirement where anyone submitting a DYK nomination must review a pending DYK. Have such processes been considered for GA? (Obviously, there would have to be some protections put in place to ensure that GA approvals were not given out without due process, but there are always ways to make that happen). --Noleander (talk) 16:53, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

The raw number of GANs has actually plateaued over the past few months. Unfortunately, people are tackling recently-added articles rather than ones that have been waiting for months. Part of it is them due to them only wanting to work on articles they like (can't blame them for that), and part of it is that the ones waiting may have some baggage with them. Quid pro quo's been discussed on shot down numerous times since some people can write but not review well and vice-versa. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:19, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

If the number of GANs is flat, that is the most important indicator, so I guess there is no reason for drastic action. As for older nominations languishing, that is a shame ... I'm wondering if there could be some way to incentivize reviewers to focus on the older nominations? It seems a bit odd to have a 3-month old nomination sitting there, and being skipped by dozens of reviewers. --Noleander (talk) 17:27, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

It seems perfectly normal to have some pop culture article skipped by dozens of reviewers in favor of geography (three weeks), history (two months), and science (two weeks). Perhaps what we need is a recruiting campaign that addresses arts and pop culture editors.

The current backlog stats are always listed in the first answer at the top of the /FAQ, by the way. Today's numbers show about 10% more nominations waiting for a reviewer than last year's average. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:40, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing out that backlog stat in the FAQ ... I wasn't aware of that. --Noleander (talk) 17:49, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

FWIW, I just stumbled on Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/GAN backlog elimination drives, which is more or less what I was driving at (based on what I've seen in the Copy Editing realm) so it appears someone else already had that idea for GAC and followed through on it. If there is another GA drive someday, I'd be happy to participate. --Noleander (talk) 02:31, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing's "some pop culture article skipped" is a target, IMO because reviewers can get a good or a terrible article - and the terrible article are protected by fanatics. --Philcha (talk) 14:35, 27 October 2011 (UTC) e.

Is it time for another drive? Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 14:39, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Three months seems like a long time to me. Granted, the best long term solution may be something like "recruit more reviewers who have an interest in the big-backlog topic areas" but I have not yet seen anything specific proposed towards that end. Should we post notifications on the relevant project pages? Or institute some kind of project-wide QPQ (that is, new articles within a project cannot be nominated for GA until the backlog is under 2 months?). Unless some specific initiative is started, then, yes, GA drives will be periodically needed. From glancing at the GA drive history, it looks like they are more or less on an annual schedule: the last two were in the Spring. Maybe just have an annual springtime GA drive? --Noleander (talk) 15:46, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I think limiting the flow would be better. What about only allowing a person to only have a certain number (2?) of nominations in any given category at once? Much of the backlog is caused by editors mass nominating similar articles. I would also like to see Sport, Music and Theatre, Film and Drama (maybe Literature as well) divided into subsections if possible. Many important articles (Bands, Genres, Sports, Actors) are being lost amoungst less important articles (Songs, Games, Episodes). AIRcorn (talk) 20:59, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Having a two nomination limit at this time would reduce Music by 29, Theatre by 11, Literature by 7, Law by 7, Transport by 6, War by 6 and Sport by 4 (three nomination limit changes the figures to 17, 4, 6, 6, 3, 3, and 0 respectively). The law and literature numbers are due to just a single person mass nominating, while music has twelve nominators with three or more current nominations. AIRcorn (talk) 22:48, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

That's an interesting suggestion. I wonder if it could be enhanced to include a quid-pro-quo exception, as in: "A nominator can have at most M articles open for GA consideration at once. However, that quantity can be increased if the nominator reviews articles (for every article reviewed, the nominator can submit one additional article) but, of course, the nominator must be willing and able to perform competent reviews (no rubber stamping :-)." I dunno, maybe that is getting too legalistic. --Noleander (talk) 22:52, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Personally I am not a fan of QPQ as I think it could affect the quality of the reviews. Does anyone with experience at DYK know how it has worked there, the talk page archives seems to contain a lot of complaints about it. With this proposal there will be the indirect incentive of reviewing articles so that yours gets to the head of the queue faster. AIRcorn (talk) 23:06, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

(talk page stalker) I saw this appear in my watchlist. I think some form of drive is a good idea. I work on Music articles, and there are currently 90 articles waiting to be reviewed/process of being reviewed. And I saw that even though some music articles had been waiting over two months (number 5, Romances, nominated by Erick on August 17 is the oldest one waiting to be reviewed), Talk:Mahalia Jackson/GA1 was nominated on October 21 and was selected to be reviewed less than 5 days later, yet the reviewer hasn't even reviewed anything in the article yet. My point is, I think it's a bit unfair that people are waiting nearly two and a half months without any sign of getting reviewed, yet some people review nominations which are literally 2/3/4 days old. I understand that people will review ones they are interested in, but I think it should be made a rule that no one can review a nomination less than a week old (if there is over a certain amount of articles in that topic waiting to be reviewed); perhaps this way people will be prompted to review older ones. Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 22:24, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I disagree with this sort of instruction creep. Editors are free to review any articles listed at WP:GAN, and if I choose not to review articles about trivial pop music or musicians who fail to interest me, that is my business. Jezhotwells (talk) 22:56, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

It isn't nice for nominators to have to wait such a long time for a review; I've been there, and it can be discouraging. However, making such a rule would not encourage me to review articles that I am not (for whatever reason) interested in reviewing. By the way, it's now (almost exactly) three days since I initiated the Mahalia Jackson review. That's not ideal (not exactly outrageous either), and I nearly always begin reviews immediately after selecting them. I intended to start this one later on the 26th, but have been kept off Wikipedia by real life issues. That really has no bearing on this discussion though. There is a shortage of reviewers; preventing them from reviewing the nominations they're inclined to review is unlikely to encourage them to stick around.--BelovedFreak 23:19, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Positive reinforcement is always a good idea. Some form of GAN-reviewer award of barnstar has been long overdue. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 23:21, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Responding to some of the comments above, I think it may be time for another GAN drive, perhaps in December when people are home and have time available to review. I don't like QPQ for reasons stated, but I'm leaning towards a maximum number, though I would go to 5 at the lowest (it would only cut the backlog by 20 or so, but those affected may be more inclined to review). I get annoyed at the ones that sit for 3-4 months without a review, but there's not really a way to force them. Basically what ends up happening is that I tend to review them and do what I can, though I don't exactly do it with a good attitude as I would when reviewing an article I'm interested in. I would be fine waiting seven days to review (if you want to review the article that badly, you can wait a bit and see how it feels for the rest of them). Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 02:27, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

It's kind of like natural selection, you nominate a boring article or have acted like a dick when a previous one was reviewed then it sits around a lot longer. A limit may reduce the number of these articles coming through as it will affect mass nominators whose articles get picked up early less. I feel five is far too high though, it will barely make an impact. I like two, its not like it's a race and it will reduce the number of articles quite substantially, especially in music which is perennially backlogged. If someone is racing then they can still nominate in different categories, spreading the burdon amoungst reviewers. A backlog drive is only a temporary solution and are people really motivated by barnstars? I would much rather have a simple and personal thank you. AIRcorn (talk) 04:27, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

If the music (or any other subject) articles are taking some time to be reviewed, its in the nominators own interest to review some of those already waiting. I only review history articles, that's wheat interests me, but once or twice I have had a bad experience with other editors during a review and avoid their nominations. Limiting the number of nominations an editor is allowed, is a non starter IMO, nobody stays around here for ever, so why stifle article improvement. I also tend to review more than I nominate about three reviews for each nomination and have noticed other editors doing the same. Probably like me they want to get rid of the backlog so their own article has a better chance of a quick review. I would be happy with any drive but what guarantee is there that articles that have been waiting the longest would get reviewed? Jim Sweeney (talk) 08:24, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

It may be in their best interest but many are not doing it. Toa Nidhiki05 currently has nominated 10 articles in the music category and is reviewing none. They all seem to be individual songs written by one band. It's a similar case with Jherschel, SchroCat and Leszek Jańczuk. I don't see how this would stiffle article improvement. If they are only here to get a green spot then they are probably in the wrong business. It is not like DYK where articles go stale if they are not nominated straight away. Wikipedia:Peer review limits individuals to four articles at a time, and in theory it should be easier to do most peer reviews than a good article review. Drives are all well and good, but why not look at some long-term solutions. AIRcorn (talk) 22:06, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

This is what is annoying me. Last night, Talk:Scott Joplin/GA1 was nominated at 22:14, 28th October 2011. By 22:58, 28th October 2011, it had a reviewer. Only 42 minutes went by. I'm sorry, but this nomination should be quick failed or something. I'm not allowed to review GANs anymore because I was told that I was only reviewing Mariah Carey articles and Mariah articles which were nominated a very short time before I reviewed them. Since this has been pointed out to me, I am now aware of how it is not fair and wrong. Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 10:43, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

If you want to review those types of articles, go for it. Those that told you off probably won't review them anyway, so it's a bit hypocritical. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 15:28, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

It is probably not in the best interests of the project for one editor to focus on such a narrow group. Why not review some non-Mariah Carey articles in the music category? It's not like there is a shortage of Pop songs nominated. AIRcorn (talk) 22:06, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, in fact it is good to do articles on other topics as that, for me, has been illuminating in how to create my own good articles and get them promoted. Jezhotwells (talk) 00:34, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I did review other articles, Beyonce; Leona Lewis; Lady Gaga; Rihanna. I don't review anymore, I was told not to. Calvin • ^NaNaNaC'mon! 00:46, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I've just very recently started reviewing GAs (I've only done two so far but intend to keep at it) but here are my thoughts on the issue. I totally agree with the "process of natural selection" view above. Those who nominate topics that are more appealing to GA reviewers, or have proved easier to work with in the past, or who have put in the time to write a well-sourced problem-free article that isn't going to be a hassle to review, will get their nominations reviewed sooner. I have no problem with that. Sure, two or three months is a long time to wait, but c'est la vie. There's no guarantee when you nominate an article that it's going to be reviewed lickety-split. And maybe it's no fun to see a bunch of newer articles reviewed ahead of yours, but I'd recommend those editors just get on with editing their next article, and eventually they will see their older article reviewed. If anything, I feel bad not for those who have to wait, but for people like Wizardman who feel obligated to review articles they aren't interested in. I may well occasionally review articles that I'm not interested in, but if I do, it will be more to lessen the load for reviewers like Wizardman, than out of any huge sympathy for those who have to wait a long time. Moisejp (talk) 19:24, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Glad you want to keep at it, despite the naysayers it can be an enjoyable process. While skipping articles you don't like is perfectly acceptable something really needs to be done about the backlog. If for nothing else than the possibility that it is turning people off nominating articles due to the perceived wait time. A major problem here is that the backlog has been around for so long now that it is ignored or accepted as part of the process. The FAQ even seems to suggest that having one is a good thing! Unfortunately until there is general agreement that something should be done then nothing will happen. My major beef at the moment with a three month wait is that a nominators situation may change. Of the last nine reviews I have conducted (all from near the end of the backlog) only one was finished with the original nominator. It is demoralising to invest time in a review and then to not get a response. AIRcorn (talk) 01:40, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

That makes sense. Well, I would support a drive, and take part in it. Moisejp (talk) 13:36, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

The three month backlog can be a problem. I recently saw a GA review in which the nominator had waited three months for the review and now he didn't have the time to respond. The last time I had a GAN I worried that someone might start reviewing while I was on vacation. I had already waited two months and didn't want to start all over. Obviously, it would be great if people would do one review per GAN and then pick the article from the top. Maybe we should just make a note of it somewhere in the process of nominating an article. --Maitch (talk) 18:01, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

It looks like there is consensus for a GA drive. 182.68.38.234 (talk) 01:53, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Reviewers are all volunteer's and if we start telling them which articles they have to review, they might not want to play any more. Look at DYK and the problems they have with Quid pro quo reviews. The articles listed the longest are one each in education, world history, language and linguistics, and two in theatre, film and drama, with the backlog down to ten weeks. Its not the end of the world, by all means have a drive but there is no need for any drastic measures.Jim Sweeney (talk) 19:10, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

There's the main problem, editors thinking that ten weeks (it's actually eleven) is acceptable. A GA drive is only going to be a temporary fix, the numbers will increase again quickly. AIRcorn (talk) 21:42, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I think a drive is acceptable. I don't think any new rules about who can review or what people have to review is necessary. I have tried to do my part by reviewing articles further back in the backlog, and have even branched out in to articles outside my main interests of television and science. I quite enjoyed John Rowan, for example - an article unlikely to pique the interests of many reviewers due to its apparently dry and history-centric subject matter. One problem I have with reviews is that many GANs I have encountered seem to be nominations for the purpose of a peer review, rather than an assessment of the GA criteria that an an article meets. I'm not saying that GA reviews should be a quick rubric check, but when major structural changes, copy editing, or content additions are needed, I'd rather feel ok with doing a quick fail or withdrawal request than having to do a peer review to outline everything the nominator needs to do to improve the article. I have done that, and many nominators are good sports. Other have not been such good sports. That makes me less likely to start a review of a backlog article that I think will need major improvements. AstroCog (talk) 15:01, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Backlogs drives were in May-June 2007, July-August 2007, October 2008, February-March 2009, April 2010 and March 2011

Here is a graph showing the backlog since May 2007 taken from here. The bot has missed the odd day, but it should be a good representation. Depending on where you stand with good articles you could read different things into it. I think it is fair to say that for whatever reason the backlog currently equilibrates somewhere around 275 unreviewed articles. It also suggests that a backlog drive is effective at reducing the backlog, but not at keeping it down. I would feel better about doing a drive if there were some changes introduced aimed at permanently reducing the current equilibrium. AIRcorn (talk) 22:57, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

That graph, certainly for recent drives, suggests that the drives only very temporarily remove the backlog and after that it returns to normal and remains steady. Either I'd suggest doing a drive for two or three months or a post-drive surge be maintained to keep the backlog right down, maybe even eliminate all requests. And perhaps beyond that, some other idea to prevent the backlog resurfacing. Yep, just like a magic wand eh!? Brad78 (talk) 23:47, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

There is much value in a drive, even if levels return. It "clears out" the build-up, and contributes in other ways; for example by rewarding reviewers. Will someone knowledgeable take up the mantle of having one in December? Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 14:50, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Portia labiata

Talk:Portia labiata says the articles was promoted to GA on October 21, 2011 - see also Talk:Portia labiata/GA2, where User:Unionhawk reviewed. But Portia labiata still says, "An unassessed article ... Currently a good article nominee." How can it be resolved? --Philcha (talk) 23:38, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Looks fine to me. If the gadget is showing old assessment information, sometimes just reloading the page is all that's needed, but it loaded fine for me. Imzadi 1979 → 00:00, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Looks fine to me, too. I imagine the browser should be refreshed. Binksternet (talk) 00:19, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. --Philcha (talk) 16:06, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Bot screw up

Resolved

What is going on with the Boardwalk Empire review. I failed it and the bot removed it and showed it as being renominated.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 00:39, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

It seems to have corrected itself.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 05:28, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

It isn't a screw up, if the bot runs while you are changing the template this sort of thing can happen. Jezhotwells (talk) 13:09, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

How can Philcha help the GA project?

I am ill and must give up reviewing for GA. At the same time I can still write articles, hopefully to GA level but very slowly. Is there any way I can reduce the load on other reviewrs? --Philcha (talk) 16:38, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

You're not that big of a drain :P Just get well soon! Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 18:26, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree with David Fuchs; be selfish, think of yourself. But may I say that I find it rather creepy to talk about yourself in the third-person? ;-) Malleus Fatuorum 18:49, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• I find it rather creepy to talk about myself in the third-person. The template has no paramether of personal message - I wonder why ;-) --Philcha (talk) 08:14, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry to hear that you're ill. If you wanted to "do something" that wouldn't take too much time or energy, and would avoid a lengthier commitment, then I have two suggestions:

• Look in at Wikipedia:Good article nominations/Report every now and again to see what's happening (if anything) with some of the oldest reviews. Sometimes people need to be prodded to wrap up old reviews, or we need a note here about a review that's been abandoned by its reviewer. Checking one or two and leaving a brief note if there's been no activity for several weeks takes only a couple of minutes. Similarly, sometimes old second-opinion requests can be resolved quickly, without requiring a significant commitment.
• Stop in at Wikipedia:Good article reassessment. Sometimes the issues are simple, so five minutes' work provides a significant benefit to the nominator.

I hope that you feel better soon. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:38, 4 November 2011 (UTC

Thanks, I'll start soon. --Philcha (talk) 08:14, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Quick fail

I had quick fail the article. Anyone else is welcome to tell the nominator anything else I missed. Best, Jonayo! ^{Selena 4 ever} 15:17, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Reviewer needed for Occupy Wall Street

The GAN for OWS needs an uninvolved editor to pick up the review from a very involved editor who mistakenly began reviewing the article, using the GAN process to push his POV against consensus. Please go to Talk:Occupy Wall Street/GA1 and check in. Binksternet (talk) 18:38, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, given the backlog of GANs, I see no obvious reason why this shouldn't be placed back in the queue to wait its turn for an uninvolved editor. It was just nominated today. AstroCog (talk) 18:46, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

It's almost certainly a quick fail—a look at the article history and the friction on the talk page will be decisive. I cannot do this myself because I am involved. Binksternet (talk) 18:54, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Done. AstroCog (talk) 19:02, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

December 2011 Backlog Elimination Drive

I've created a sub-page for the Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/GAN backlog elimination drives/December 2011. Let's organize our efforts there. I'll add some other stuff to it later. AstroCog (talk) 20:00, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Also, add your name if you want co-coordinate with me. AstroCog (talk) 20:01, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

I can jump in as a coordinator if needed, though I'd rather take a backseat and just review for one rather than running it. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 20:43, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

As I've suggested above, how about running the drive for two months? Brad78 (talk) 22:09, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. I'll make the change. AstroCog (talk) 22:17, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

2 months is too long. Even 1 month can cause coordinators to suffer burn out. (Trust me, I did one month before and it's gruesome.) One month of backlog elimination drive is good enough. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 03:18, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Start the drive now, say November 15, and let it run until the end of December as a compromise. A month and a half is not too long or too short and it also allows people who are going to be home for Thanksgiving to contribute. 88.80.28.70 (talk) 07:13, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanksgiving - remember the rest of the world. Jim Sweeney (talk) 07:16, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

While I understand burn out for a two-month drive, the statistics above always show the backlog bounces back to normal anyway. I just feel with a two-month drive, even if burnout happens during the second month, it should keep a lid on the bounce a little more than normal. Brad78 (talk) 22:09, 7 November 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.28.99.159 (talk)

• Do you want Signpost coverage for this? Maybe bring a wider audience. Crisco 1492 (talk) 16:11, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
  • There's a trade-off. While it's good to have more people aware of the drive, you may also bring sub-par reviewers which duplicates the efforts because their reviewers will have to be reviewed by third party. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 16:38, 9 November 2011 (UTC)
    • The more participants the better. If just a couple of new reviewers turn up and decide to stick around it will ease the burden in the long run and help keep the backlog down. AIRcorn (talk) 21:44, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• Okay, I'll put a temporary blurb (in brief) in. Please ping me if there is a decision that we should not post it. Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:55, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Also, where is registration? Crisco 1492 (talk) 00:02, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Drive reviewers add their reviews to the Running total section on the drive page. Looking at past drives, I didn't see any registration pages/sections. AstroCog (talk) 02:20, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Alright, sounds good. And they sign their names on the page too? Crisco 1492 (talk) 07:04, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Just to point out for all here: there is a talk page for the upcoming drive here. AstroCog (talk) 02:20, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Yes. AstroCog (talk) 15:26, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

1992 Major League Baseball expansion draft

I nominated this article here a little while ago; it's got a little while to wait before its turn, though. However, an editor brought to my attention that he sees it as more of a list, and therefore FLC, as opposed to an article for GAN. I had considered which was the more appropriate venue when I nominated it and chose GAN because I felt it was a list embedded in an article, rather than a list with prose. However, I may have been mistaken, and I sure don't want to wait however long it will take for this to come up for review only to be told I brought it to the wrong place, which delays this getting promoted and would delay my place in the queue with a confirmed article. Please give me some advice: does the above article belong here or at FLC? – Muboshgu (talk) 01:57, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I am leaning towards featured list. I looked through the featured lists and there a number of draft articles there and I did not find any in the promoted good articles. AIRcorn (talk) 03:11, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't even see this as borderline, the article should be withdrawn here and submitted at FLC. Courcelles 04:35, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

In hindsight, I guess you're right. I'll withdraw it and nominate something else here. – Muboshgu (talk) 05:33, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Request for reviewers for educational assignments GANs (for mid-November)

Some of you may already be familiar with that :) As I've done in the past, I am assigning my students to improve sociology-related articles on Wikipedia to Good Article. Since this is an educational assignment, the students will need their work reviewed within few days of them requesting a review (they are supposed to request one by November 14, and the course ends within a month of that - and we cannot expects the students to contribute past the grading period, sadly). At the same time I'd ask the reviewers to give students extra time if they need it - some groups may need an entire month to address the issues raised (and some may do it within days - no different from an average editor, really...). Just as I've done in the past several times, I am asking for reviewers to pre-sign for the articles to be reviewed (list below), and in exchange I promise to review myself an article from our backlog (I'll start soon). This time there will be eleven articles to review:

Group 1: College and university dating (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 2: Grounds for divorce (United States) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 3: Double burden (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 4: Family honor (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 5: Personal wedding website (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 6: Single parent (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 7: Marriage in the United States (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 8: Family in advertising (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 9: Open relationship (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 10: Bride scam (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Group 11: Joint custody (United States) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Promised reviews by me on my end of the bargain: 1) Talk:Weiquan movement/GA1 2) Talk:Nuclear energy policy of the United States/GA1 3) Talk:Tom Kahn/GA1 4) Talk:Birth control movement in the United States/GA1 5) Talk:Collaborative fiction/GA1 6) Talk:Outlaw Star/GA1 7) Talk:United Nations Security Council Resolution 82/GA1 8) Talk:Ivan Shishman of Bulgaria/GA1

If you would like to review one or more articles, please post here and cross it from the list above. I'll post the articles I've initiated a review for here, too. Thanks! PS. You are more than welcome to check the student progress before a good article review and offer comments. Some groups are progressing very quickly ( :) ), while others, despite graded course deadlines, have done little or nothing yet (sigh...). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 18:03, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

If any are able to complete it by the end of October and nominate it by then, I'm willing to review it quite quickly (if the students are anything like me though, they'll all be nom'd on the 14th lol). Beyond that I can't make any guarantees personally, as I plan to edit sparingly the last month or two of the year. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 18:29, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll do one (joint custody). Sounds like fun. Just let me know the time line and if any groups have chosen it. AstroCog (talk) 02:14, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll take Marriage in the US. Ditto with Astrocog's comments. Ruby comment! 03:50, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm willing to take on Personal wedding website. I'm likely to have time to review this in November. I've cleaned up some of the other wedding-related articles on occasion, and based on the difficulties there, I sincerely wish the students luck with finding enough independent sources to write a decent article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:55, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm fine with reviewing any. Buggie111 (talk) 02:35, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, two down, nine to go (students are supposed to be already working on all of those articles, but their progress varies significantly). If you select an article from that list, please do not hesitate to drop by the article's talk page, introduce yourself to students and offer the any early advise you think is relevant. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 03:21, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Still waiting for more reviewers... :) --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 22:07, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I've taken college dating and Bride Scam. Buggie111 (talk) 18:44, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll take Grounds for divorce. Looks like it needs lots of work. Jezhotwells (talk) 02:35, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Single Parent looks like the best of the rest. You may need to start cracking the whip soon. AIRcorn (talk) 06:37, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Yep, I've begun doing so. In the end, however, I cannot force them to do anything, and some groups will probably produce problematic entries :( On the bright side, there are always those who do pretty good work, so... the usual :) --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 03:52, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Still need 5 more articles to be taken. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 02:46, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll take open relationship. Seems in alright shape. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:38, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. That still leaves a few... expect the nominations to appear today. Some are in a pretty good shape, but a few are still not where I'd GAN them. Unfortunately, I cannot force the students to actually do some work, IF they are don't want to do any work. I apologize in advance. ATM bride scam and personal wedding website seem simply not comprehensive and barely beyond stub. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 18:18, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Looking for four reviewers

For the educational projects described above. Expect the nominations to appear today or tommorrow, and I'd love to see reviews by the end of this week. Thank you, --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 18:19, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Cyrillic in sources

Greetings! I have a question regarding the use of Cyrillic in citations. In the review of Michael Shishman I have been told that the citiations should be in Cyrillic; while at the current GA review of Ivan Shishman, I am told the opposite and the reviewer has suggested to bring that issue here. How are we going to proceed? Should the citations of books in Cyrillic be left in that alphabet or transliteration into Latin? Regards, --Gligan (talk) 20:09, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

My personal thought is to leave the title in its native language and alphabet, but provide the English translation of the title. The {{cite book}}, etc templates have |trans_title= to deal with that, and if you are using citation templates, that's probably the easiest way to go. If you aren't, you can emulate that output though. Imzadi 1979 → 03:47, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think there is anything wrong with the way you have done it. The National Anthem of Russia is a featured article and doesn't even use the transliterations. AIRcorn (talk) 04:18, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

As the reviewer who asked for the above changes, I want to clarify I am fine with the Imzadi's solution. The best reference will have both the original text (title and publisher, at least), and the translated text for them. For non-Latin alphabets everything really needs to be transliterated. I wonder if there is something in the MoS about it? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 00:06, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

If there is a translation of the title, a transliteration isn't really needed, and in fact would clutter things needlessly. Imzadi 1979 → 00:15, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Also, it's worth remembering that the WP:Good article criteria don't require anything at all in terms of citation formatting. I don't want to discourage people from making improvements, but if the reviewer can figure out what source the citation refers to, then it clears the (very low) bar set by the actual criteria. Consequently, inconsistency or some level of incompleteness in citation formatting is not technically something that articles should be failed over. (See the commentary on that criterion.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:13, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

I guess I misspoke; a translation is of course preferable to simple transliteration. But a transliteration can be useful, for example some sources may prefer to use a transliterated, rather then translated title when referring to a title. And of course we do not translate names. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:42, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Watch this nomination page / RSS / Atom

I just saw this nice footer now added to all Article Alerts page: Wikipedia:Article alerts/Report page footer. I think it would be helpful to have a variant of it added to all GAN nominations. I wanted to create a template/page for us, but there is a bit too much code for me to parse that page. Do you think it would be a good idea to add it to our nominations (we already have a toolbox with disambig/link tools)? If so, could somebody assimilate those tools for us? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 20:29, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Failing nom

hello,

the nominator of Otis Redding is now away and will return at the end of this month. I don't want to wait so long, as I want to bring it to TFA on 10 December (not important if it fails or not, I just want to try it out; it is a challenge). There are now these options:

1. Either I fail this article myself and search another review; he should review it right after I put this tag on the talk page. If someone is willing to do that, please let me know,
2. Or I fail this and bring it to FAC.

I now want to here from you any suggestions which of these two options are the most effective, and why. Thank you.--♫GoP♫_T^C_N 21:56, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

I think SilkTork waited long enough (six weeks) for improvements and the article should be failed. He would have passed it if it was ready; instead, he announced his upcoming online absence. The article is not ready for WP:FAC, not by a long shot. (No mention of San Francisco Bay or Sausalito? Incorrect quote of Bill Graham saying "biggest gig" rather than "best gig"? No mention of how Redding influenced Janis Joplin? No reference to Geoff Brown's book Otis Redding: Try a Little Tenderness or Zelda Redding's The Definitive Otis Redding? The glaring mistake about the accidentally wrong versus intentionally false ending that Redding put into his final song at Monterey Pop?) I would recommend submitting the article to WP:Peer review after the GAN is closed. Binksternet (talk) 22:54, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your review. Not only long enough, but too long imho. He should have quick-failed it right from the beginning. The GAN was more like a Peer Review, anyway I will put this to PR. All in all it was a little bit too long and sluggish, but very helpful.--♫GoP♫_T^C_N 11:56, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Request 2 community reassessment

Request community reassessments for Warcraft II and Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares. In individual GAR, both ended with new objections, giving me so change to response. And in Master of Orion II the reviewer wrote, "... indeed possibly also WP:NOT: this is not an encyclopedia article at present, but a gameguide with reviews" - but Master of Orion II has many good citations, including several game reviews from good sources - some about just this games, and some about its use as the "gold standard" for reviews of other games. --Philcha (talk) 15:23, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Those were both delisted over a year ago. If they now meet the criteria you would be better nominating them here rather than going through community reassessment. AIRcorn (talk) 04:47, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares/1 IMO needs independent review by a community GAR, as the individual GAR(s?) raises confusion at several points. In particular, User:Geometry guy raised new points but [22:49, 15 August 2010 immediately close the GAR without giving me a change to respond, and he claimed that the article is "possibly also WP:NOT", contrary to a good selection of cites that already in place. --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

• I suggest for each person contribution to the community reassessment of Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares: a numbered list for "Supports"; a numbered list for "Opposes"; and a bullet list for "Comments". --10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
• User:Teancum's start of the individual GAR (left column shows the every start) said "Recommendation - immediate delist to C-Class and ..." without strike outs. --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
• At 11:51, 11 August 2010, Teancum said, "Keep GA listing - article issues have been sufficiently resolved," but did not close the case. --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
• At 22:49, 15 August 2010, User:Geometry guy said, "Delist, with regret. I wanted to close this reassessment as keep, but am unable to do so, as the huge imbalance between the long Backstory-Gameplay-UserInterface part (primary sourced material on how to play the game) and the short Development-Reception-PostPublication part (secondary sourced material on responses to the game) suggests to me that the article fails criterion 3, and indeed possibly also WP:NOT". IMO that statement ignores Master of Orion II: Battle at Antares#Reception, which has: --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Reviews from the late 1990s. --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
  • The Origins Award for Best Fantasy or Science Fiction Computer Game of 1996 (cited). --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Aggregate scores from GameRankings and Metacritic, summarising earlier reviews. --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
  • From the late 1990s, a mixture of praise and complaints, all cited. If it helps, I can unpack these into individual reviews. --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Chick's retrospective review described Master of Orion II and its predecessor Master of Orion as "looming large" in any discussion of space-based strategy games.(cited) Master of Orion II has been used as the standard for comparison in reviews of more recent space-based 4X games such as Space Empires IV (2000), Galactic Civilizations II (2006–2009) and Lost Empire: Immortals (2008).(cited) --Philcha (talk) 10:32, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Educational assignments

There are numerous nominees associated with university courses and, therefore on a tight timeline. Because they are being edited by new users a good degree of patience and instruction should be used. Such articles looking for reviewers include:

• Assembly of the Poor (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Reservation in India (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Family honor (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Family in advertising (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Dysgraphia (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Eye movement in language reading (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Learning to read (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Rapid automatized naming (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Double burden (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Proletarian poetry (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• William Attaway (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Rebecca Harding Davis (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Caste politics in India (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Bipolar II disorder (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Mouride (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Deese–Roediger–McDermott paradigm (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Culture in music cognition (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• McGurk effect (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Polysubstance dependence (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Life in the Iron Mills (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Blood on the Forge (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Pica (disorder) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Feminism in India (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• What Work Is (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Exercise addiction (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Barbara Neely (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Population and Community Development Association (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

I have reviewed one and will keep the review open until the course is over. maclean (talk) 03:24, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I will review Assembly of the Poor Jezhotwells (talk) 03:33, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't do GA reviews, but both Dysgraphia and Bipolar II disorder should be quick fails, even after cleanup. I left comments. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:38, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

That's why patience is required. There's no rule that requires a quick fail; any reviewer can complete a full review and place it on hold to see if there is any action. The students are required to submit the articles and have an academic stake in the review and acting upon issues identified in the review. maclean (talk) 02:14, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

If you can tackle a couple of Piotrus's requests above, then I could do one. Alas I'm stretched too thin this month already but I'll try. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 03:55, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm doing my second one now. There seems to be 4 different classes looking for attention. maclean (talk) 04:02, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I had to quickfail Assembly of the Poor on close paraphrasing grounds. I think educational institutions should vet articles that are submitted to Wikipedia as plagiarism is a serious concern. Jezhotwells (talk) 09:33, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

I'd probably give the students few days to fix such issues. But yes, even in US, there is a good number who don't understand (or don't care). I explain what plagiarism is in my class, I have special penalties for it, and some still do it, claiming afterwards that "but I thought we are supposed to use their words" and such. Sigh. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:23, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

I think some form of in-house pre-GA nomination check would be useful; similar to Peer Review but focused on paraphrasing, image copyright, lead, referencing for scientific articles and the tone (many read like essays) of the article. Too many are coming in not even close to GA standard and those seem to be some of the major problems. AIRcorn (talk) 21:17, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

I think the class ambassadors should steer these instructors/professors of 3 month classes away from Good Articles for two reasons. (1) I don't think it is realistic to expect someone (already with a large workload to go from newbie to GoodArticle writer in such a short time). It is nice to have the free article-writing labour (like interns), though. (2) This current batch of classes have surpassed this project's ability to provide reviews before the end of their class. As we can see here (and above) there are volunteers willing to provide reviews, but getting 30 targeted and expedited reviews is unlikely. maclean (talk) 22:27, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

An easy solution is to require that course instructors provide at least one review for each they request from the community. My example shows it is quite doable. Of course, this would require the instructors to know and care more about Wikipedia than just "a place for students to write articles that I never have to edit myself". Which is something I've been arguing for quite a while... Instructors need to be involved with Wikipedia, too. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 00:03, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

That'd be great. Its unlikely to become a rule, but it could be an effective incentive (or unwritten policy). maclean (talk) 04:49, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I feel the instructors time would be better spent preparing their students for the GA process. It will be interesting to see how many of these actually make good status. AIRcorn (talk) 13:52, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I imagine it would be difficult for an instructor to properly prepare their sudents for the GA process if they themselves have no experience building/reviewing articles. I would love to help review some of the literature-related topics I see listed above, but the article histories gives me very little hope, as does the scant editing background of the instructor. A week ago I left comments at Talk:Rebecca Harding Davis after it was nominated for GAC, but little has been done by the students involved. A shame, because these are some great topics. María (yllosubmarine) 14:08, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

It's a bit chicken/egg, if they have no experience writing good articles then for many it is harder to review them. Maybe some more experienced reviewers should work with the instructors. We could have some kind of GA holding cell for educational assignments and just let ones we know have a shot into the GA queue. They don't have to conduct full reviews just make sure the article is attempting to cover all the criteria. I would imagine many commenting here would recognise an article that does not have a chance of succeeding pretty quickly. AIRcorn (talk) 00:57, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Which is why I've been also saying that if an instructor asks the students to write a GA, s/he should've written at least one him/herself already. Asking students to do something one has never attempted, from my perspective, is not very ethical. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 01:50, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll try to review at least three from the list above as soon as I can, probably tomorrow. PS. The ones I am most likely to help are Proletarian poetry (started), Caste politics in India, Mouride (started), Feminism in India and Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (started). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:14, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Analysis on quality

See here: PowerPoint: Wikipedia's poor treatment of its most important articles

Some discussion of Good Articles albiet admittedly not much analysis there. I'm less familiar with them.69.255.27.249 (talk) 16:43, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Have just read the first 25 or so slides of that PPT, and it's quite interesting, but not altogether surprising. It would be good to summarize the results and recommendations from this report, as they apply to Good Articles, during this discussion thread. AstroCog (talk) 18:05, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Good plan. Am interested in that perspective. Don't know this shop much. Also have one page on GAs (kind of a starter list of ideas to analyze) in Background.TCO (reviews needed) 18:59, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

One thing that might make improve issues raised in this is to encourage reviewers to review high-visibility and/or top-importance articles. This could be enhanced by highlighting in the nomination list those that are top-importance on n-or-more projects (n obviously at least 1, but it could be more if an article is bannered for many projects), and/or have some minimum threshold of mean page view per month. Magic♪piano 20:21, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

As a reviewer I would appreciate something like this. Scanning 300 or so articles it is easy to miss the important ones sometimes. AIRcorn (talk) 00:17, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

I would certainly like a GAN list that was sortable in various ways: nomination date, topic, importance, etc. AstroCog (talk) 00:29, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

0.6% of Good Articles are on the Vital Article list? Doesn't that mean that Vital Articles are dramatically over-represented in the GA system? maclean (talk) 21:50, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I made the same observation at WT:FAC: "When I look at the [Vital] level 3 list (1000 articles), I count 82 FAs and 70GAs. That means that 1 in every 12 articles on this list is an FA, 1 in 14 is a GA, and 1 in 7 is either. For Wikipedia overall, the figures are 1 FA in 1120, 1 GA in 288, and 1 of either in 228. The quality of Wikipedia's vital articles are well ahead of that of the project as a whole." Resolute 21:55, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

There certainly is a positive correlation of quality with importance. Absolutely. For instance 0.4% of articles are GA+, while 3% of eyeballs are hitting GA+. Still...not positive enough to get the 3% to something respectable. Also distressing some small signs of GA becoming more obscure lately. For instance the VAGAs actually dropping in absolute numbers. Also the median page views of a recent promotions sample was less than that of the category as a whole.TCO (reviews needed)

Correlation is not causality. Do eyeballs follow the GAs, or does traffic encourage polishing? Andy Dingley (talk) 22:28, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I wasn't asserting a causality. I was making the point about correlation as a purely mathematical statement to agree with Resolute. If you look at slide 93, you'll see a weighted average of quality by page view. This is a different chart than if you did the same thing with articles only (I gave an example of this, above).

I didn't study it, but I highly doubt that ranking drives eyeballs. Traffic is coming in off of Google and off of inherent popular interest in the concept. It's not coming from the GA page or random GA article or the like. I suspect that the reason for the improvement to some minimal level has to do with more eyeballs. But actually more profound is probably the factor that more real content contributors are interested in more relavenet topics. Most prose "meat" on a given article is built up by a few heavy adders. (I haven't studied it, but other have and reported on it.) The model of every random user adding a word or two and that is how an article forms is not how the thing really functions.TCO (reviews needed) 22:58, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

An excellent analysis. Thanks for sharing. I hope it is transformed into a Signpost essay, at least! --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 02:07, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Comments on old reviews

Hi I have just been reading the Wikipedia:Good article nominations/Report. Some of the older reviews are of concern, with three of them over fifty days old, the oldest eighty-seven days. Should we automatically fail nominations if they are going on to long, say over twenty-one days? Jim Sweeney (talk) 10:58, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

That would be my preference, but some folks seem to like long reviews. I think it is fair to say that there are several different points of view about this. Jezhotwells (talk) 13:21, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

I'd auto fail them of there has been no activity for a given period of time (two weeks?). It would be great if the nom and the reviewer could be auto pinged on their talk pages before that happens, though.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 20:10, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

I plan to either close myself or put back in the queue anything over a month old before the GA drive starts in December. There's no exsue for a review to go two+ months. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 21:14, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Bot not working

I think I followed the instructions to list Yogo sapphire in the "Geology, geophysics and mineralogy" subsection, but the bot hasn't listed it after 30 minutes. What is wrong? PumpkinSky talk 20:29, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Looks like the bot's down, no updates for the past 12 hours. I'll go poke Chris. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 21:55, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Looking for two reviewers

For my remaining two educational GANs, family honor and family in advertising. Let me note that I've at this point delivered on my promise or reviewing one article for each that my students submit (as my class worked on 11 articles, 11 reviews have been started by me within the last two months, and 8 have already been closed). I do plan to continue and help with the backlog, going above the 11, and I'd hope that the GA reviewer community will do me the favor and in their work on backlog and educational GAs will consider prioritizing the two articles I mention above. I'd very much appreciate it if the reviews on them were started by the end of this month. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:42, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll do the advertising one. I have not done a GA review before so bear with me. PumpkinSky talk 20:38, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll do Family honor. --Noleander (talk) 23:48, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

Encouraging instructors to review articles in return for faster reviews

As noted above, the recent trend in educational assignments that try to have students submit their work for GAN is increasing our backlog. I think that there is a simple solution: motivate the instructors to review at least one article for each article their students submit (this is what I do, and I don't see why other instructors should not be able to do the same). I am think that we could have a standardized message that we could append to talk pages or the instructors, and/or the educational good article reviews, informing the instructors (and ambassadors) that there is a backlog (most of them are probably blissfully oblivious to that), and asking them to review articles so that they at least do not contribute to it. In return, we would prioritize the review of their articles. This way we wouldn't have to deal with a growing backlog, and instructors and students would not have to worry about "will my article be reviewed before the class ends and grades are due". I am trying to word it so it is friendly and challenging, rather than "you are making us do more work, so you should feel obliged to help out" :> I'd appreciate suggestions as to the best wording, please see my early idea for an instructor's talk page message below. If people like it, we could template it. Also, do we have a page that explains the idea of the Good Article backlog better than this bare list? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 21:34, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

“ Thank you for submitting the work of your students to the community Good Article review process. Please note that Good Article reviews have a considerable backlog. This backlog means that Good Article nominations may wait even more than two months before they are reviewed. To ensure that educational assignments are reviewed more promptly, we would like to encourage you to review one article from the list at Wikipedia:Good Article nominations for each good article that your students submit. If you do so, please announce that you are reviewing articles at Wikipedia talk:Good article nominations, and in return, we will try to expedite the reviews of your class' articles.) ”

It might work if the instructors are experienced wikipedians (especially if they've got an article to GA standard themselves), but if inexperienced CAs with limited English are going to be doing it for each others college (or even their own college) then it'll be hard to maintain high standards. DexDor (talk) 21:49, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. I should note my idea is stemming from the long and rather successful SUP project, primarily focused on the English speaking Western countries, not from the India fiasco. As I said earlier, I do believe that if a course has a goal of a GA, both the instructor and CA should have experience writing them, but it does not appear my idea has gained much traction :( --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 00:26, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, I think instructors should be strongly discouraged from using GA as part of course evaluation. You are an exceptional case because you know exactly what is involved, but the other instructors I have dealt with should definitely not be doing GA reviews, and really shouldn't be using the GA process at all. Looie496 (talk) 16:49, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

GAN issue

I nominated Against All Odds (2008) 2 weeks ago, though I've had a problem. It has to do with the template and the talk page. The template had an error and now the text on the page won't show up and you can't edit it. Somehow I got another GAN template in there done correctly, but the old one is causing a problem still. I figured it would fix itself, but now there seems to be a confusion over whether the article has been passed or not due to its state.--WillC 23:53, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

It looks like Wizardman has fixed it. Jezhotwells (talk) 15:13, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

A Good Article Review WikiProject

I have noticed that there is a huge backlog of nominations at the momment. I was wondering if there would be any consensus for a WikiProject Good Article Nominations Reviewing or something along similar lines to try and clear the backlog. I would be happy to create this is there is any consesus for it. Oddbodz (talk) 19:10, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

That sounds like it is within the scope of Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles#Scope. Would a new wikiproject add anything new or better? maclean (talk) 19:42, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Didn't notice that WikiProject there. I'll go and add my name to the members list. Thanks Oddbodz (talk) 20:05, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like you missed the discussion about the December 2011 Backlog elimination drive. That discussion was automatically archived, which is unfortunate. The drive starts tomorrow. AstroCog (talk) 15:01, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

December 2011 Backlog Elimination Drive starts tomorrow!

Just a reminder for Good Article reviewers to join the backlog elimination drive that begins tomorrow, December 1st. Our goal is to reduce the backlog by 50% or more. Plenty of barnstars and medals to be awarded at the end of the drive. Go to the project page for more info, instructions, and to add your name to the participant list. Cheers, AstroCog (talk) 15:04, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Specific question re: "significant contributions prior to the review"

I've never reviewed a GA nominee before, but I'm thinking about identifying an appropriate one to start on. I have knowledge of Core Four, but I'm also second on the list of contributions per editor. In this case, that means 16 of the 332 edits (4.8%). I will not review this article unless I'm absolved of any conflict of interest prior, and if I am absolved, I'll start the review this week. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:21, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

I'd say that if you've made that many edits prior to the GA review, then you shouldn't review it. There are roughly 400 other GA nominees that could use a review, though! Cheers, AstroCog (talk) 19:27, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

And I'm looking at a few of the older ones, but I would prefer to dip my toe in the water with subject matter I'm familiar with first if I can. Of course there comes the Catch 22 that the subjects I'm familiar with, I've edited on. I just wasn't sure whether or not 16 edits, less than 5% of the total, counted as "significant" or not. If there's even a slight question on it, I suppose that means I should pass. – Muboshgu (talk) 19:31, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think the edit quantity matters as much as the edit quality. Sixteen edits could be the result of fixing typos or adding categories, whereas one edit could contain the addition or alteration of paragraphs of material. If you feel you've substantially edited the article, then definitely don't review; however, 16 vandalism reverts/typo fixes/infobox tweaks do not count as substantial edits in my book. María (yllosubmarine) 19:44, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

María is quite right. The question is, have you added any content to the article? If you haven't, then go ahead and start the review. Malleus Fatuorum 00:52, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Brief reviews

I'm not really involved much in GAN, but this Monsey Church review just hit my watchlist, and looks unusually short. I've left a note on the reviewer's talk page, but wondered if those of you involved here wanted to take any action. One aspect of the article that looks problematic is that the writer claims authorship of images from both the 1800s File:Abram-Van-Houten.png and the 21st century File:Phillip-W.-Dennis-II.png. These are liable to be deleted as copyvios on Commons. --99of9 (talk) 00:02, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Same with Talk:Texas State University–San Marcos/GA1 by the same reviewer. Bencherlite^Talk 00:18, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

• I have re-assessed Monsey_Church to B [23] based on the images. Will someone review Talk:Object permanence/GA2 which is being initiated by an IP (I've already failed the first review) and Talk:Feminism/GA1 which seems to have been mistakenly initiated (delete the page?) maclean (talk) 01:59, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

• All of the above is now fixed. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 03:03, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Question in connection with nomination for One Tree Hill (TV series)

Hi there I have come across a Good Article nomination for One Tree Hill (TV series). While on a very quick look through, it seems good. There is one striking thing missing. The final season starts in 2012. Would it be normal to nominate a series article for a GA review when its not complete. I am looking at the criteria number 2 Factually accurate and 3 Broad in its coverage, as it would be out of date every time a new episode aired. Jim Sweeney (talk) 06:32, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Same would go for;

• Grey's Anatomy under review now
• Arrested Development (TV series) under review now
• The Walking Dead (TV series)

I wish Arrested Development (TV series) was back. There is precedent for it. Treehouse of Horror (series) and House (TV series) (both are still creating new episodes) are Featured Articles. 30 Rock and Modern Family (both are still creating new episodes) are Good Articles. maclean (talk) 06:54, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

This would also apply to BLPs, current sports teams, bands and many other articles that need continual updating. I would just review it up to the current season, make sure that it mentioned something about 2012 and leave it at that. If it is not updated correctly it could be sent to good article review later. AIRcorn (talk) 06:59, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Moved article, messed up GA nom

The GA nomination for Java War (1741–1743) seems to have been goofed up. The article was [en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=Java_War_(1741%E2%80%931743)&oldid=464312228 moved] earlier today, which goofed up the link to the nomination from the talk page. As such, I moved the nomination to the new title to fix the talk page, but now the nomination is not showing at WP:GAN. Is there a way to fix this? Someone had already said that they were willing to review, but has not started yet. Crisco 1492 (talk) 16:00, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

It all seem to be showing OK now. It does confuse the bot when pages are moved during a nomination as it refers to its own database (created when the nomination is originally made) to check on status. The bot probably had a sulk or someone did some fixing. Jezhotwells (talk) 17:12, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

• Ah, so it (may) do it automatically? Okay, thanks. Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:13, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

LAW GAN nominees also nominated for deletion

• Andrew Chan (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Myuran Sukumaran (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Renae Lawrence (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Martin Stephens (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Michael Czugaj (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Scott Rush (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Matthew Norman (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

are the next articles in the GAN Queue for LAW and all have been nominated for deletion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Andrew Chan. In my opinion these nominations should await the outcome of that discussion. Jezhotwells (talk) 15:07, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Seems reasonable, standard practice even? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:49, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

The AfD has been closed as keep. Jezhotwells (talk) 13:26, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Actually, closed as "keep" for Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, and as "no consensus" for the others. Bencherlite^Talk 00:49, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Cynfarwy

Resolved

 – Article has been listed as a GA. Bencherlite^Talk 10:07, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

I am reviewing this article. However, there is only a very small amount on the life of the subject. I accept this may well be the sum of current knowledge about him. However, I am reminded of the section of WP:RGA (a guideline) that says: "Not every article can be a Good article. If the references to improve an article to Good article standards simply do not exist, then you should not overlook that part of the criteria." Does this article fall under this criterion? Are there any similar articles which have or haven't been listed? Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 19:01, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm the nominator. You could have raised this point first on the review for my attention, or alerted me on my talk page to the fact that you were bringing the issue here, you know, rather than rely on the fact I might spot this section on my watchlist. Nidan and Caffo are two other GAs about Anglesey-based saints; neither are long, and little more is known about them than about Cynfarwy. Pontius Pilate's wife is based on one sentence of the Bible. I look forward to the start of your review. Bencherlite^Talk 20:18, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I meant to. This seemed the most important issue so I cracked straight on with resolving it. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 21:10, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Both of those are somewhat longer. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 21:11, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Why not have this discussion on the review page with me, then? Bencherlite^Talk 21:41, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

I thought that outside involvement was useful. As I say, I meant to drop a note by the review page to notify you. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 21:55, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

• The criteria states "it addresses the main aspects of the topic" and should be read as a contrast to WP:FA? which requires "it neglects no major facts or details". That is to say, only facts or details that are known can be reported. Generally, the article rating system is about how well developed the article is, not how much coverage 7th century saints get in historical research. maclean (talk) 21:42, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

In my reading, that would be against WP:RGA (quoted above) - but that's not to say I'm not in favour of it. I don't really have an opinion. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 21:55, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Grandiose (thank you) has passed the article as a GA; thanks for Maclean25 for your comments. Bencherlite^Talk 10:07, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

And thank you for tying up this thread for me. Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 10:09, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

No problem. And thank you for thanking me. Bencherlite^Talk 10:16, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Object permanence

Will someone review the GA status of Object permanence? It was passed a couple days ago [24] and I re-assessed it back down to B-class at Talk:Object permanence/GA1. It was re-nominated [25] and passed again [26] without creating Talk:Object permanence/GA2. maclean (talk) 01:42, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Reverted on the grounds that no review had been conducted, although it smells a bit socky. Might need watching for a while. AIRcorn (talk) 02:07, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

I removed the good article icon (it was buried way down in the article, as if to make it harder for editors to locate). Ruby 2010/2013 17:11, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

The article was renominated, I picked it up, but User:TamaraHamilton gave it a pass even though I hadn't started to review it yet. I'm pretty sure this is the same user to tried to sneak it through before, yes? Admin intervention on that user is probably needed. – Muboshgu (talk) 20:17, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

I just did a review of McGurk effect and learned that it was part of a psychology class assignment. I suspect the same is true here. It could be that this is just a case of those students having no clue how to work with GANs rather than some shenanigans...of course, it wouldn't be the first time that college students instigated shenanigans, either. I suggest we all keep an eye on these psychology/cognition-related GANs. Cheers, AstroCog (talk) 13:17, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Nominator started review, how to fix?

I see that the nominator of Nonsynaptic plasticity also initiated a review, no doubt out of ignorance of the process (this is an article written for a class project). How should this be fixed? Looie496 (talk) 00:44, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Tagged it for deletion under G6 (technical deletion) AIRcorn (talk) 02:10, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Help with reviewing prose

I've been doing a number of reviews lately, and whereas I'd like to thing I am pretty good at reviewing most criteria, my strength is NOT in prose. I can of course catch glaring errors, but as an ESL whose work often needs a native speaker polishing, I don't think I am able to review prose as well as some other reviewers. Now, to some extent, all reviewers have their strengths and weaknesses, but I wonder if there is somebody who would like to help with prose reviews in my reviews? In exchange, I'd help out with one of the other elements I am pretty confident with (MoS, references, coverage, images...). Alternatively, I am thinking of annoucing all reviews I do here, so that anybody who is so inclined can offer a second, supplementary review on prose. FYI, I currently have three reviews open: Talk:Proletarian poetry/GA1, Talk:Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper/GA1 and Talk:Caste politics in India/GA1. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:54, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

You can always use the Second opinion option. Jezhotwells (talk) 04:23, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

The what? Where is that? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 16:15, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

See WP:GAN#Second_opinion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:35, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

dashboard app

The one linked in the reviewer's tools, alongside the dab and elink tools. What does it do? I admit I have not a clue. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 06:10, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Well, it gives a potted history of edits to the page, highlights major contributors and most recent contributors, can give clues about edit warring and thus give pointers to editors other than the nominator who may be interested in the review. Jezhotwells (talk) 15:16, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Where do you need to click to get this info? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 16:16, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

On the word dashboard. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:45, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Nominations

I am new to nominations as such, so I'm am curious about something. If you get an article reviewed and make the changes, isn't it good practice for the reviewer to state all the problems at once? Rather than wait fail the article (with limited to no problems) then when the changes are made, tell you there are other things to do. Also, can an article be failed based on a classing placed on the articles talk-page that was obviously a mistake? Jayy008 (talk) 19:18, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure that I understand your question exactly, but here's some general information:

• The reviewer does not need to tell you every single problem at the same time. Sometimes people list the biggest problems first. Other problems are interconnected: if they tell you that you need to completely redo the section on ==Whatever== with better sources and better attention to an unbiased tone, then it doesn't make sense to also tell you that you have grammar problems in that section, because those grammar problems may go away when you re-write the section.
• Passing or failing should be based on the reviewer's understanding of how well the article meets the WP:Good article criteria. The contents of the talk page are irrelevant except for two points: they might show serious disputes about the article's content (alternatively, such discussions could just show that there's a troll on the page, or that an ignorant person asked a question), and they may show that the article is already FA, in which case a nomination for GA is not considered appropriate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:24, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, that did answer a lot for me. Regarding bullet point one: The user told me there were two bad sources on the page, but then I sorted that and then the user told me there were two other bad sources on the page. Regarding the second one: One of the articles was failed because "lists don't qualify for GA." I don't really understand that. Jayy008 (talk) 21:39, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

The Wikipedia:Good article criteria states What is not a good article?: Lists, portals, sounds, and images: these items should be nominated for featured list, featured portal, featured sounds, and featured picture status, respectively.. maclean (talk) 22:58, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

To answer just the first question, there should be a group of questions after the article is read, absolutely. Whether that's all of the problems or if there are more to be found varies, but those that note bits and pieces at a time then sit and wait forever are annoying. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 23:17, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

@Maclean, it was incorrectly labeled one of those. I wouldn't have nominated a list. @Wizardman, agreed, if there are issues seen, I don't see why the reviewer can't say all of them. Having to keep going back and changing things after you think it's done. Could somebody look here and actually tell me why it was failed. Jayy008 (talk) 21:17, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

The reviewer was very clear: "This is a list class article and thus is ineligible for GA status as per WP:WIAGA#What is not a good article? Malleus Fatuorum 00:47, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Erm, no. I said the article was mis-labeled, which was very clear considering what the article is. Jayy008 (talk) 14:22, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

On your question about naming all the problems at once: if the reviewer works like I do, then the reviewer doesn't actually know all of the problems at once. I first read for basics, and report what I find then. I later double-check all the sources, and report what I find then. I have occasionally spent six hours on reviewing sources, including trips to the library. I'm not going to keep a secret list of problems just because I haven't finished checking every single one of them yet. (And how do you think you would you feel if I said, "Here's the problem, which I've known about for two weeks now, but didn't tell you because I wanted to dump everything on you at once, and it took a while to get that last source checked"?) WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:33, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

You make some good points. Jayy008 (talk) 16:41, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

How to use the GA review checklist?

It would be good to have an explanation of how to use the checklist template. For example, one is this:

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

• How do I fill in [[File:|16px|alt=|link=]] part?

Thanks, MathewTownsend (talk) 00:44, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

The choices are y (yes); n (no); or ? (not yet decided). Jezhotwells (talk) 01:48, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

But where do you put them? I just now tried it in the template above and couldn't get it to work. Exactly where do you put those choices? MathewTownsend (talk) 01:54, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

I think something went wonky with your template above. When I use the template, it produces something like {{GAList/check|}} for each criteria (i.e., without the numbers in brackets). Then, after the "|", you put your input: either y, n or ?. Dana boomer (talk) 01:58, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Well, I copied that one and a couple of other from the instructions on Wikipedia:Good article nominations and all of them had something peculiar about them. Fortunately I have a mentor, so perhaps when he comes online again he can help me.

{{subst:FGAN}}, {{subst:GAList}}, {{subst:GAList2}}, {{subst:GATable}} or {{subst:GAHybrid}} This is what is on that page, and none of them are intuitive. They're all weird in some way and I can't figure them out. Maybe it was a mistake for me to try to review an article and I should bail out. MathewTownsend (talk) 02:25, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

The lists aren't a requirement to use, so if you're struggling with them, you can still follow the guidelines without actually having that pasted on. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 02:36, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

If you want to use that list, then maybe you'd like to edit Talk:Personal wedding website/GA1 and copy the list out of there. Then you can change the bits that say {{GAList/check|}} to add the right code (listed here) to give the responses you want. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:41, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

ok, thanks! I think I'll do that. MathewTownsend (talk) 02:45, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Ely, Cambridgeshire/GA1

Not sure what to do. Is a week a long time? I posted Ely, Cambridgeshire to GAN about one week ago and within a few hours, Lampman (talk · contribs) started the review. However, despite my gentle poke, admittedly using the phrase "take your time", nothing has happened. What is the correct protocol here? I really do not wish to upset the reviewer (is that ever wise?) yet I only have access to the source library books for a limited time --Senra (Talk) 15:27, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

I have aded a comment to the review page, lets see if that has any effect. Jim Sweeney (talk) 16:12, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

OK, thank you --Senra (Talk) 16:15, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Whilst I am here: I am happy to try and help with the GA review process providing I had someone to mentor me. I have one FA and two GA's, so I am not well experienced. I have just looked through the backlog and could find nothing within my comfort zone; basically Geography of places, biography of people (not BLP's). I have some general interest in maths (but not at the level of Hilbert Transforms) and computing. I may be able to tackle one review per week. If you are willing to mentor, let me know on my talk page --Senra (Talk) 16:04, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Following this, I have asked Aircorn (talk · contribs) to act as a mentor to my GA reviews --Senra (Talk) 22:45, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

An IP reviewed a nominee at Talk:Hit the Lights (Selena Gomez & the Scene song) - therefore it failed

I'm pretty sure there is a rule against an ip reviewing an article, but one reviewed Hit the Lights (Selena Gomez & the Scene song) and the bot removed it from the nomination list. I don't know how to reverse this. (I wasn't the nominator.) Thanks, MathewTownsend (talk) 23:55, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

Actually, it was never nominated; it only popped up on the GA page for a few minutes because people don't know how to read directions. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 00:19, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

ok, didn't know. Thanks. MathewTownsend (talk) 01:10, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

Jerem43's reviews

I'm not sure where else to go, so I'm coming here. Jerem43 currently has two reviews that are 2.5 and 3 months old, WAY over the guidelines. After they were seemingly abandoned a month back I put them in the queue, which he reverted and said he was waiting for issues to be fixed. A month later, the issues remain, and I want to fail them, because clearly concerns are not going to be addressed if they haven't already. That was also reverted though, so I'm out of options. I don't really know why he wants to keep them under review indefinitely, but it's becoming a pain. Not sure what to do in this case. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:43, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

I would have appreciated you notifying me that you are/were discussing me, only if for common courtesy. --Jeremy (blah blah • I did it!) 07:08, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

If no work is being done on improving the articles they should be closed. How about a proposal that any Good Article reviews over xx days old are automatically failed. If we can vote and get a consensus on that, we should be able to deal with the problem. Jim Sweeney (talk) 17:58, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

• I like the idea. My suggestion would be 30 days. AstroCog (talk) 18:02, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think the issue here is so much the length of time that review is open, but the length of time the review goes without anyone actively improving the article. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:05, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Precisely. No matter the situation, there is no instance where a writer needs multiple months to actually fix an article; if an article is that bad that a month is needed, that's what quick-fails are for. I'd be fine with a 30-day mark from when the review is written as an absolute max. I think I'm one of the few left that still subscribe to the seven-day mark. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 18:07, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Let me get this straight: a reviewer has mismanaged a GAN, and this is being used as a reason to introduce a new rule that will constrain good faith nominators and reviewers in their efforts to achieve the best possible outcome for a GA nomination? Has no one heard of Hard cases make bad law? Geometry guy 03:57, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

• For what it's worth, the article I made this topic on is at about a 100 day review with the reviewer refusing to make a decision. If you don't like the current wording, then give me a better idea because something has to be done. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 20:23, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Why does something have to be done? I can't see how this will help get Good Articles reviewed more or provide any other benefits to the project, apart from taking a few "under review" and "held" articles from the nominations page. AIRcorn (talk) 04:15, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

OK then 30 day maximum from the day the review is started.

The two reviews were held up for a couple of reasons that are not being discussed here, and have not been mentioned. The first one (PepsiCo) was because the nominator disappeared after the first week. I made several attempts to get him back in the discussion to no avail, so I asked another contributor who is interested in the subject to step up. He was able to do some work and had other issues and has finally been able to get to the article. The second was held up due to real world issue with myself and the nominator. Once we were able to get together, we were able to finish the review and the article passed.

My question is why do we have to rush through this stuff? If people are actively working towards a common goal and are delayed for one reason or another, why must another uninvolved person were say end it now or I will? I personally was bothered at the forwardness of the two people who stepped in and said "You're taking too long, I'm ending this." I understand being bold, but that was bordering on rudeness, IMHO. I can understand their wanting this to move at a certain pace, but imposing your belief on others where there is no set policy can be upsetting.

It's a drain on resources. There's a few hundred GANs; if we took a month for each one, it would soon grow to a few thousand. --Rschen7754 07:28, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Sure, but if we take a month on three or four of them, does that really matter? For that matter, if we take three months on two out of those hundreds, is that going to have a material effect on the nominations queue? It's not like having a review in an "open and ignored" status is actually consuming the precious resource of editors' time. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:08, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

That is a very succinct summary of my thoughts. If I and one other editor are working on bring something to a better state, whose resources are we taking up? Other than being on a list on one page, what resources are we over utilizing? Our time is our time and how we utilize it is our choice as volunteers to Wikipedia. Improvement can be made in a short amount of time or it can take the form of a longer process which two individuals work together to improve something. Forcing arbitrary timescales on improvement to a project that relies on the talents of people who are putting their own personal time into it can can cause resentment and nothing being done. With more than 1.4 million articles on Wikipedia, the question we want to ask ourselves is whether we want to tell our contributors improve the information now or not it all. In my experience when you tell some one who is doing something for the love of something (in this case knowledge) in a field to do it or else, often they tale the or else and be done with it leaving the status quo. Let people take the time to do it right, not tell them to fail if it isn't finished in a set span of time. --Jeremy (blah blah • I did it!) 20:56, 13 December 2011 (UTC)

30 day limit proposal

The proposal is: "Any Good Article reviews over 30 days old (starting from when the review begins) are automatically failed." --Noleander (talk) 13:15, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Support Jim Sweeney (talk) 18:14, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support if it's reworded to say that they are failed or returned to the queue depending on the issue. Should be fixed sooner ideally of course. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 18:35, 29 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose The issue here is not the length of time that review is open, but the length of time the review goes without anyone actively improving the article. My question is, if two editors are actively working to improve an article, how is that a problem? Our goal is write better articles. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:38, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

  Based on personal experience of having done this forever, for every review that goes over a month that both sides are working collaboratively on back and forth, there are 10 that are either abandoned or are barely moving at all. Those ten are a problem, and I highly doubt anyone would enforce it on ones that are clearly going well, since the original guidelines were never enforced to begin with. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 18:50, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

  Then why not reword the proposal so that it's only about reviews that are abandoned or barely moving? (Right now, it includes reviews where both sides are working collaboratively back and forth.) A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:22, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

  I'm reluctant only because I could see people trying to game that, like suddenly leaving a few comments on day 29 and leaving again, though I would hope that wouldn't happen. Besides, even if the rule is put in place I think people will know to use their discretion. The World War II GA review went way over a month, but I never had a problem with that due to the size and collaboration as an example. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 19:51, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

  You want to introduce a rule so dubious that on the one hand, it will only be applied "with discretion", while, on the other hand, you are concerned about editors "trying to game" it? Geometry guy 04:24, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

• Support there comes a time when the GA process and an indulgent reviewer is being used as a peer review substitute, which isn't what GAN is for. Articles can be improved after the 30 days without being held in the lists here and then brought back for a further GAN when ready (and I'd have no problem with the original reviewer being asked by the nominator to take it if he/she is willing). Writing better articles != spending months in a /GA1 review. Bencherlite^Talk 18:51, 29 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support: I definitely see where A Quest For Knowledge is coming from; inactivity is usually what stalls a review, which was the main issue noted in Wizardman's original comment. However, I'm 100% in agreement with Bencherlite above, in that a lengthy review process has its place: PR, not GAC. In the majority of the reviews I've undergone and undertaken, it need never go over two weeks. A month may even be too long for a standard review, but a forgiving rule such as this will help for unforeseen time constraints, such as when a nominator or reviewer is unexpectedly AFK. María (yllosubmarine) 19:11, 29 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support I'm in basic agreement with Bencherlite's reasoning. I know I wouldn't enforce the rule on any review for which editors are actively improving, so long as they are addressing the issues/concerns from the review. I think this is the least we can do to help with the backlog of nominations. Personally, I'd be in favor of raising the bar for GA nominations in general: only major contributors to an article can nominate, evidence of copy edit & peer review before GAN, etc. Such requirements might reduce the number of GANs, but I think it would encourage more voices to weigh in on an individual article (pre-GAN) and would prevent drive-by noms. Cheers, AstroCog (talk) 21:13, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

• Needs clarification I'm generally supportive of this proposal, but my thinking, and the concern of many of those opposed, is that the auto-fail shouldn't apply if there is good-faith editing to address the GAR. I think the proposal should be reworded to say something like, "Any Good Article reviews lacking evidence of active good-faith improvements will be automatically failed after 30 days (starting from when the review began)." AstroCog (talk) 04:24, 3 December 2011 (UTC)
• All you'd be doing is moving the queue to peer review and/or the GOCE, not eliminating it, and neither is better resourced to deal with the work than GAN is. Malleus Fatuorum 00:42, 2 December 2011 (UTC)
  • Good point. I'd say though that many GANs I read need these steps. AstroCog (talk) 04:26, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

    If a reviewer does not fail an article where editors have stalled on improving the article for 30 days, then the main problem is with the reviewer, not the article. The current proposal doesn't just need clarification; it is completely wrong-headed. Geometry guy 04:38, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

• Support New to this, but makes sense. I also agree if it's being actively worked it can stay on the candidate list. PumpkinSky talk 21:30, 29 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support—even if the review hasn't been abandoned, the reviewer and nominator can continue their work on the article's talk page without the article being listed in the queue for ages. When the article is ready, it can be formally renominated, re-reviewed and listed at that time. If anything, a month is overly generous and could be shortened to 14 days. Imzadi 1979 → 21:48, 29 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose a 30-day time limit. Sure, most should be completed much faster than that. But good work sometimes doesn't follow the calendar very closely, especially if someone's been out of town or seriously sick for a couple of weeks. I might be willing to support a 60-day time limit, but 30 is too short. Also, I'd rather see an activity-related limit: people should be poked when there's no activity for, say, 14 days in a row. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:17, 30 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - Pretty much everything that I would say in support of this proposal has already been said, especially by Bencherlite above. Obviously there will be some cases where this rule should be disregarded (IAR...such as the case of the WWII review previously mentioned). However, GAN is not PR, and should not be used as such - a month for a review is more than enough, and other than in special circumstances, a review shouldn't take much more than a couple of weeks max - a few days or even less is common, especially if both the reviewer and the nominator spend a good deal of time on WP. Dana boomer (talk) 21:28, 30 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - I wish this wasn't needed, but as the backlog illustrates there is a need to keep reviews quick and to the point. Nothing prevents a reviewer from continuing to help improve the article (especially with respect to items not required by the GA criteria) on the talk page for as long as they like. maclean (talk) 07:42, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support If the article cannot be brought up to standard in 30 days then it shouldn't have been nominated. I would personally prefer 14 days. As has been pointed out, if the reviewer wishes to help the nominator with further work then thay can do that alter. GAN is supposed to be a light-weight process, it is up to nominators to check against the GA criteria before nominating. Jezhotwells (talk) 11:56, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support - As a baseline rule might help reduce the backlog. Exceptions can always be made if progress is on-going when the time limit expires. --Noleander (talk) 13:12, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support tentatively - I was initially going to oppose actually, but the more I thought about it I did think that 30 days was pretty generous amount of time, especially if the review has been inactive. Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:21, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose. I'd support with the caveat: "and no activity in the past 48h despite notification of the reviewer and principal author". --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 00:33, 2 December 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose as worded. Vital articles could well take more than 30 days to review, there could be delays due to other processes that affect GA, people take holidays or there situation changes and occassionally you have to wait for a book from the library. I agree something should be done to deal with stale reviews and would support something like this if it "and no activity for 7 (or 14) days" was added. It would be polite to ping the editors first too. Not sure how this proposal would reduce the backlog as some are insinuating, there is no guarantee the reviewer would take up another review if the one they were working on was closed on them. The backlog problem is not articles being reviewed, it is articles waiting to be reviewed. AIRcorn (talk) 01:44, 3 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support per Support comments above. It shouldn't take more than 30 days to review an article. If it is that bad, then it should be failed anyway for being under-prepared. Calvin • ^{Watch n' Learn} 01:47, 3 December 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose current wording. What if the reviewer has abandoned the review mid way? If the nominator has contacted the reviewer and there is no response, then the review should be considered null and void and the article be considered open to review and not failed. Failing and renominating would just delay the GA review. Why punish the nominator if it is not his fault? Support the tenet that if issues are pending after 30 days, then it is a fail. --Redtigerxyz ^Talk 06:38, 3 December 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose as currently worded; "automatic" leaves little or no room for a review to overrun, for whatever reason, even with the consent of both parties involved - and if the reviewer and nominator are happy to keep going over it in detail, why should we shut down the process? A recommendation such as "should be failed or relisted", perhaps, but "automatically" is problematic. Shimgray | talk | 16:56, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

  Using "should" would make the policy ineffective (the current guideline at WP:GAN#On hold states the 'on hold' should be "one week"). I see this proposal more as enabling a second reviewer to step in and close stalled reviews. Using a hard limit should be an incentive to get the reviews done; to stop a reviewer from holding up a 'pass' over issues beyond the GA criteria (eg. MOS issues, minor prose re-wordings, etc) and to get nominators to make the reviewed article a priority. maclean (talk) 20:33, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

  In my opinion one of the strengths of GA reviewing is the relative freedom we give reviewers and I would not like to see this compromised. A procedure to deal with reviews abandoned by reviewers would be useful, but automatically failing an article started by someone else should be the last resort. AIRcorn (talk) 23:18, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

• Great idea. I'm looking forward to reviewing articles on topics I don't agree with or by editors I don't like, leaving demoralizing reviews, raising issues which are virtually impossible to address, and then disappearing for 30 days. P.O.V. Pusher^Talk 21:48, 3 December 2011 (UTC)
• Strongly oppose. This would be a big step backwards. Why penalise the article when the reviewer is at fault? If an editor starts reviewing an article, but forgets about it later, would it be OK to fail the article, just because its been under review for 30 days? The article IMO should be relisted (as unreviewed), and the reviewer who took so long should be penalised. The nominator of the article doesn't own it. If there are issues, the article could be failed by the reviewer. But if the reviewer takes a long time to decide whether the article meets GAC or not, then the community should think of penalising the reviewer, not the article. --Tinpisa (talk) 11:12, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

What do you mean by penalise the reviewer? AIRcorn (talk) 21:07, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

I meant warn the reviewer against doing it again. --Tinpisa (talk) 09:48, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

• Support - reasonable idea. GAN is to polish articles for the criteria; not the same as PRs. Tinpisa has raised an excellent point, however. —WP:PENGUIN · ^{[ TALK ]} 01:49, 6 December 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose, though I almost support it. Perhaps, instead, change the wording a bit so that:
  • An article automatically fails if it has been on hold for 30 days and there has been no activity in the last 7 days.
    • An article automatically fails if it has been on hold for 60 days and there has been no activity in the last 3 days.
  • An article is automatically relisted if it has been on hold for at least 30 days and the reviewer has not been active on it for the last 10 days.
  • An article is automatically relisted if the initial reviewer does not arrive at a decision of "pass", "fail", "second opinion", or "on hold" within 14 days.
  • An article is manually relisted if there is no decision of "pass" or "fail" after 60 days.
    • Exception: If there is legitimate discussion occurring on the article, it can continue as long as it remains active.

With these, an article and nominator are not penalized if the reviewer decides to vanish as long as the article is still being actively worked on, but if a reviewer disappears, other reviewers are free to take over. Emmy Altava 05:41, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose because the queue is so long and unpredictable it is not possible to reasonably predict how much time one will have to devote to improvements when a nomination is made. In my case, it was 3 months for about three separate articles. Likewise, it's not at all predictable--I nominated three articles on the same day, and all were dispositioned (two are on hold, one was quickfailed inappropriately without a full review) within a couple of weeks of each other. If there's no time limit on renomination (and I don't propose there be one), then this won't reduce the size of the backlog, since nominators can quickly resubmit failed articles. Hence...

  Proposed Alternate: If a review takes longer than the duration from the time the article was nominated to the first posting of a complete review OR 30 days, whichever is longer, the article shall be automatically failed. Jclemens (talk) 06:05, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose - It will not resolve the backlog. However, I do agree with Emmy's proposal. --Jeremy (blah blah • I did it!) 07:25, 6 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support maclean's tweak. I like maclean's idea above ... perhaps think of this as opening up the review process for a second reviewer to step in after 30 days, a reviewer who would be just as responsible for making reasonable calls as the first reviewer is, where what's considered "reasonable" is allowed to evolve. So for instance, if both the first reviewer and the nominator were waiting on something they didn't have any control over and intend to finish up soon, perhaps second reviewers would be expected to give them a little leeway. - Dank (push to talk) 19:27, 18 December 2011 (UTC)
  • To clarify, when maclean says above "I see this proposal more as enabling a second reviewer to step in and close stalled reviews.", "enabling" (rather than requiring) suggests to me something along the lines of what I just said. - Dank (push to talk) 01:45, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Review quality

Is it just me or did the review quality took a decided downturn in the last year? Since when did GAN become a machine to churn out green buttons people can put on their user pages? Don't get me wrong, that may be an effective motivation (at least for me it was an additional motivation, in the beginning), but by now I've seen many examples especially in the music section of people who tend review each others articles without the attention for detail, critical sense, and frankly language skills that I would have thought this process required. And unless one checks reviews made by others, which is tedious, this totally flies under the radar. We should make a thank you template for making good reviews instead of rewarding many nominations. Am I wrong/right/paranoid? Hekerui (talk) 21:09, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

It would probably be a good idea to cite specific examples of reviews you believe are deficient. If there is a systemic problem with specific reviewers or certain article categories we can examine ways to resolve any issues. –Grondemar 21:56, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

The main problem is that the review regulars generally don't touch music articles, so for those writers, they're usually stuck with having fellow music writers review theirs. It's really a damned if they do and damned if they don't situation, since people complain if one or the other happens. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 23:11, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

Agree, the editors most willing to review these are other pop song nominators. It happens in other areas too (hurricanes, roads and military history), but doesn't cause as much concern there. This is because some editors that nominate these sorts of articles do not have the best prose skills. That tends to mean that when they review similar articles it is easy for them to miss poor prose in them. There are other issues that crop up, but the prose is the one I have noticed most. We can't force reviewers to review music nominations, and many avoid them, so I am not sure what the best solution is. AIRcorn (talk) 23:40, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

You're right. And I see the same problem with many other of the popular culture articles. Malleus Fatuorum 01:48, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

I tend to avoid many of the pop music nominations, mainly because the nominators get so pissy when their prose is criticised as at [27], [28], [29]. Unfortunately, those who cannot write reasonably good prose cannot recognise that fact, possibly because they never get criticism at school. Many of the nominators of the pop culture articles are inarticulate teenagers who are a pain in the arse to deal with. Jezhotwells (talk) 02:31, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Order within a single editor's noms.

The current boilerplate states "nominations towards the tops of the lists are older, and should be given higher priority, except where the nominator has other articles under review." I have six articles nominated, all members of one season, nominated intentionally in the order of their readiness and counting on being able to incorporate feedback into future reviews. The first nominated article is currently on hold, with some feedback I'm working on. The way I interpret the process would be that the rest of my nom'ed articles would be generally skipped over by reviewers until the one on review or hold has been dispositioned... but reading the above statement, it doesn't actually say that.

Am I wrong in expecting that reviewers should generally take things in the order of nomination, when a single editor has nominated multiple articles in the same subtopic? Cheers, Jclemens (talk) 19:09, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

In practise reviewers can choose to review any article they want, so it is possible that one near the end will be reviewed first or all six be picked up at the same time. An article should not be nominated for good article status until it is ready. Any that are are likely to be failed without being held (or be ignored for months). Part of the reason the backlog was so large are editors submitting under-prepared nominations that nobody wants to touch. You have already had a lot of feedback on that series so there is no real excuse not to have them close to a good article standard before nominating them. AIRcorn (talk) 22:07, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Sure there is: It's called "backlog". Once a backlog goes away and stays away consistently, such that five days between nomination and review is typical rather than exceptional, then indeed there would be no reason to nominate articles in advance of their full readiness. Fundamentally, however, you have not explained what you think "nominations towards the tops of the lists are older, and should be given higher priority, except where the nominator has other articles under review" means. I take that to mean that if I have one article under review (I do) the rest of mine should be skipped, even if they were next up chronologically (they're not, not by a long shot) in order to avoid making a nominator address two holds at once. Jclemens (talk) 22:24, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

It says "should", not "must". The strongest definition that Wikipedia uses for the word should is this: "There may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances to ignore a particular item, but the full implications must be understood and carefully weighed before choosing a different course."[30] As reviewing is a purely voluntary action, it is unlikely that this stringent a definition (which would permit multiple reviews for a single nom) can be reasonably expected. We can encourage, but not require.

As a practical matter, I'd bet that most reviewers don't bother checking to see how many other noms you have. The primary factors in their decision are probably an interest in the subject and a belief that the nom is clueful. On that second point, your noms are probably more desirable than average. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:31, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Talk:Noisy Miner/GA1

I would appreciate some comment on this review.[31] I happened to notice it as I was considering reviewing the article myself, and I butted in (was that inappropriate)? Then the article was suddenly passed. But I don't think the nominator received a helpful review. Maybe this is just the luck of the draw. Did I muck things up? MathewTownsend (talk) 15:55, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

I didn't look at the article, but it does looks like the reviewer did a rush job without much detail. You can always put the article up for reassessment. Also, this is the first time I have ever seen somebody use a "closed discussion" on a GA review like that...especially one with pretty much no discussion at all! Somebody was being defensive, methinks. AstroCog (talk) 16:26, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes, the review is rather perfunctory, but I'm not sure it's worth formal reassessment of an article that is clearly going to meet the standard. A copy edit or comments would probably more helpful to the blameless nominator. Jimfbleak - talk to me? 07:43, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Lists vs. GA

I posted this somewhere before but the destination is hardly active, so I thought it best to be placed here. There are conflicting opinions on what defines a list or a GA. My 90210 (season 3) was failed for reasons, which is fine. However, my One Tree Hill (season 8) was failed because somebody classed it as a list. They are the same. Also some TV series' seasons are listed as GA: Sanctuary (season 2), while others a "featured list": The O.C. (season 4). While I am personally not too fussed, I'd like it to be discussed so they can all be one thing and not different. A "list of episodes..." is already a list format, I do believe that a season article isn't a list. (I will not be able to respond quickly). Jayy008 (talk) 16:49, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Have you seen this discussion. It appears to be a murky area. A simple rule of thumb could be that to be a good article the list part of the article has to be shorter than the prose (not including the lead). In the end it will probably come down to the reviewer for any that are borderline. AIRcorn (talk) 02:34, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

My philosophy has been that if the subject of an article is primarily a list or a set of items, it should go through the featured list process rather than the good/featured article process. For instance, a television season article will inherently be primarily about the list of episodes, no matter what other content is in the article. Therefore, they should become featured lists rather than good articles. –Grondemar 03:50, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

However as Jayy points out there are inconsistencies when it comes to television series. While most featured seasons are lists their are some featured articles. As some topics can be written in either list or article format differentiating between the two by topic might not work. AIRcorn (talk) 04:23, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

If I remember correctly, lists weren't considered for GA-status because, at the time, the FL and GA criteria were functionally equivalent and it was believed that people would apply for featured status if they could (and that GA reviewers would actually fully read WP:GA? which says lists cannot be GAs). But that was a long time ago. Since then there has been a major re-vamping of WP:FL? and list articles have had their prose portions expand so now, like the examples above, they are actually half-list/half-articles. maclean (talk) 04:26, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for all the info, guys. The main issue to me is that some are listed GA and some are listed FL, I think they should all be the same, considering they're the same articles. But judging by the explanations here and on that other discussion, I guess when the main focus of the article is the "list" it should be nominated as FL. Jayy008 (talk) 14:04, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

E. W. @ pass?

Currently, a redlink for E. W. @ is the most recent article listed at Wikipedia:Good articles/recent.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 05:08, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Edgars2007 (talk · contribs) erased it, but this edit must have been triggered by some other problematic edit on wikipedia somewhere that must need fixing.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 02:00, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Nominator has ignored suggestions

I reviewed Lost in the World (see my review here), a song that is "supposed" to be release as a single in the near future, and quickly failed it because the article is not stable. According to the revision in which I reviewed the article, this sentence "as of December 2011, it still has not been released as a single." caught my eye and believe that if/when this song is release, it will be updated frequently (peak positions, chart debuts, live performances, further promotion, certifications, more music reviews, etc). Also, the prose is not up to GA standards and have not gone through a decent c/e and through WP:PR (as suggestions for improvements). After the user removed the notifications, he renominated the article. Also, since this topic is being brought up, I believe creating a new rule that failed GANs cannot be renominated within a week, should be enforce. This can also help lower the poison chamber that is the backlog. Best, Jonayo! ^{Selena 4 ever} 01:18, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Re-quick-failing a nomination on the grounds that valid issues identified in the previous review remain unaddressed doesn't take much time, so I'm not really worried about the effect on the backlog.

But it seemed to me that we once had a written "rule" about failing all noms for pop culture before the song/film/whatever was released, and I can't find that anywhere. (The logic about the article being doomed to instability seems compelling to me, but perhaps others disagreed.) It's not fair to spring unwritten rules on noms, but if it exists, we should point it out to the nom and suggest that he consider a voluntary withdraw on that basis, rather than waiting for the inevitable quick-fail. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:35, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Under "Theatre, film and drama" it says PLEASE DO NOT NOMINATE ARTICLES ON FILMS THAT HAVE NOT YET BEEN RELEASED; AS DETAILS WITHIN THE ARTICLE MAY CHANGE, THEY WILL BE FAILED. So that's where you saw it! MathewTownsend (talk) 01:42, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for replying guys. So should the article be withdrawn? Best, Jonayo! ^{Selena 4 ever} 02:18, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

The quick-fail criteria Wikipedia:Reviewing_good_articles#First_things_to_look_for include: "The article specifically concerns a rapidly unfolding current event with a definite endpoint." But I don't think Lost in the World falls under this since it was released in September. Best to let another editor deal with it. The problem with quick fails is that engenders bad feelings in an editor who has worked on an article (however faulty), and then feels dismissed by a quick fail without being given a chance to fix the problems. Not worth it IMO. I never do it. But that's my view. I want editors to feel they have been given a chance, even if their article is not very good, from the GA criteria point of view. (Helpful points are in Wikipedia:What the Good article criteria are not.) MathewTownsend (talk) 03:22, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Heidi Montag

I've been waiting for almost two months for this article to be reviewed; can someone who is willing to review it please do so? Till I Go Home (talk) 04:29, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Note: this is currently the oldest unreviewed GAN. Till I Go Home (talk) 04:33, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

That's a 50% improvement vs. waiting 3 months for one of mine a few months back. Feel free to help out by doing some GA reviews yourself. There seems to be a renewed commitment towards shortening queue times; we'll see how long that fares after the current backlog elimination drive is finished. Jclemens (talk) 04:40, 28 December 2011 (UTC)