This is the page for discussing colours, layout, presentation, and similar issues with the front page.

Old talk:

New Straw poll (non-binding)

Should we have a new Front Page NOW or leave current front page and visit the issue later?

POLL:
1: We want to design and introduce a new temp page now:

2: We want to leave the current front page for now (leaving open the prospect of revisiting the issue):

3: We want to let people design new front pages if they like, and judge the outcome of their efforts after actually seeing them:

2+3: We should announce a competition of new design on press release.'

4: This is a stupid "vote".

If a new front page at some stage, what should it include/exclude?

Include:


Exclude

If leave the front page as it is for now, when should the issue be revised?


Motivation for above vote

The voting on TEMP5 finally produced a result of

which going by comments broke down into

So, not surprisingly, given the wording of the question, the result was still unclear. It could be interpreted as opposing the current page, opposing TEMP5 or if those who were against TEMP5 were for the current page but just didn't say it, an endorsement of the current page. This ambiguous mess solves nothing, and will probably just result in more votes on alternative temps. We need clarity. In reality we have two questions facing us.

  1. Do we want a new main page or is the current page OK for the moment, leaving the issue open to be re-debated at some time in the future?
  2. If we want a new page what what should be on and what should be out?

Rather than having this issue drift on indefinitely, with Temp6, Temp7 . . . Temp 12 . . . Temp 21 etc being debated ad infinitum, I think we should focus on the two questions above. So lets start the final ball rolling. FearÉIREANN

I agree. The idea of the proliferation of dozens of temp pages gives me the creeps. 172 16:12, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Object to vote - structure of vote presupposes that we want to start a "final ball" rolling. I don't. Martin

So do you prefer going around in circles, spending weeks voting in a manner that at the end still doesn't reach a conclusion on anything? That's all the votes we have had up to now have produced. Nothing but confusion. This way we will have one final decision, which we can then use as a basis to work to the next step. FearÉIREANN 19:59, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

The "ambiguous mess" solved a key question: should we replace the current main page with Temp5. The answer was no. It also provided information on what people liked and disliked about it. And lots more besides, in fact.
Final decisions are inflexible and overly conservative for a wiki, in my opinion. Martin

Include/exclude debate

When or if it decided to introduce a new front page it should be based on what the community recommends below. (The final draft or drafts should go to the community so that, every step of the way it rather than a small group makes the decisions.) FearÉIREANN

Designers should feel free to design the design that they think will have the most community support. This may or may not correspond to the outcome of the opinion poll above. Sometimes people don't know what they like until they see it, for example. Martin
Mock ups can always be produced, Martin. But the way it was arranged before we were going around in circles, discussing everything and actually deciding on nothing and not even know if we wanted a new front page to begin with. That is the first question we have to decide. Then when, then work to a template reflecting people's views. That is how professional decision making is done. FearÉIREANN 19:57, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
See above - it decided on plenty of stuff.
It's not how professional design is done, in my experience with the h2g2 redesign, for example. Martin

how to vote

Not sure quite how to vote. I believe the main page could be improved and would like to see it change, and I support that. My vote against Temp5 was simply because I did not see it as an improvement. On the other hand, I do not feel any particular urgency to update the main page, and do not believe that the timing relative to the press release is important. Generally, I consider it unlikely that the press release will have the degree of impact that is ascribed to it by some Wikipedians. As a means of proceeding, I would suggest that a decision first be made on what to include, what to remove (Temp5 was too cluttered); design can follow. Kat 22:18, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

That is why I called the vote, as all the votes we have called have been badly worded and negative, what do we want 'x' temp or not? This time it is a positive vote: keep the main page or change it, if change, indicate when, what should go in it and what should be left out. Martin may be happy producing temps every week or two but most of us are bored silly having to constantly vote on them. This way, clear decisions can be taken with a clear outcome, with a design based what people want, not the latest design designed by a small clique and presented as a fait accomplait. FearÉIREANN 22:45, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Should Temp5 replace the current main page?

Votes and comments have been archived at Main Page/Temp5/Votes archive.

There are currently 17 votes for and 28 against. So basically rejected, but you can still express your opinion there if you want.
A summary of the comments follows. This does not include comments which would not help in future redesigns such as "it's better" or "It's abominable". You can add to these if you like.
Temp5's been modified a little since then - these comments apply to older versions.

Good things

Bad things

Suggestions

Timing

Voting procedures

Moved to Meta: m:Voting procedure and m:Talk:Voting procedure

Discussion

move to Talk:Main Page/Temp5

"Other languages" section

The "Other languages" section is real ugly. I suggest using a colspan 2 cell at the bottom for all the languages and sister projects. Even then I would put smal tags around all of it and give the cell a light gray background. --mav 02:09, 5 Aug 2003 (UTC)

It didn't look right with colspan 2 as it was then too far down the page (and it got lost in an edit conflict anyway). The current version has the small tags and grey as suggested which I think is an improvement. Angela 21:13, 5 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Small colspan 4 looks good. I put that there. LDan 01:22, 7 Aug 2003 (UTC)
That's not colspan 4, that's 4 columns. It is now double-small as the whole thing already had small tags. Vicki and I have both commented on Talk:Main_Page/Temp5 that it is now too small. Please can you explain why you did this (preferably on the temp 5 talk page rather than here). Thanks. Angela 01:28, 7 Aug 2003 (UTC)


When to implement

We should have the main page layout decided by when the Wikimedia press release gets out. It looks like the majority of people voted for the new design (7 to 3), so can I please impliment it?

I wish I could say yes, but the vote only started on August 4th. I'd say wait a week. Angela 18:02, 7 Aug 2003 (UTC)
There should be notice on the main page, or a message to each wikipedian. How could such an important change be decided by just handful of people? wshun 18:07, 7 Aug 2003 (UTC)
It is now listed on the recent changes page and on the village pump. Can someone decide what the cut-off date should be and advertise on the English mailing list. Thanks. Angela 22:30, 7 Aug 2003 (UTC)


There are a few things brewing right now:

It seems like people want to wait until all three are finished, and do them all at once. I am obviously a big supporter of temp5, but I do think we should wait. When the time gets closer, it will probably be announced on the Announcements page, the current Main Page, and the Village pump. For now, please direct all your suggestions and criticisms to Talk:Main Page/Temp5 so we can concentrate on making a main page that everyone (well, almost everyone anyway) is happy with. Be specific, and be ruthless :) -- Merphant 22:22, 7 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Regarding link for vote on Recent Changes

I am glad to see my suggestion of a link on the recent changes to the vote here proved useful. However in the interests of clarity I would suggest a slightly different wording. What is there now, Vote on the new design of the main page is ambiguous. It could be interpreted as another vote on the current new page. A clearer working would be Vote on the proposed replacement design for the main page. That are three important word changes.

I think that sentence is more factually correct, less potentially ambiguous and also more correct grammatically. FearÉIREANN 23:19, 7 Aug 2003 (UTC)

BTW when a final cut off date is set, I'd suggest stating it on the village pump, the wiki-l and on the Recent Changes page, ie, Vote to finish on 14th August or whatever date is chosen. That way you add a bit of urgency into the thing. FearÉIREANN 23:19, 7 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I don't think it is a good idea to vote at this point. Many people have now chosen to take a stand, which will make it harder to address their concerns -- people usually don't like changing a position once they have taken it. How about scrapping this vote and turning it instead into a "List of things people want to see changed before they can accept the proposed alternative design"? Yes, I know that is slightly unfair towards those who don't want it to change at all, but those could still vote against the new design once it has been finalized.—Eloquence 02:19, Aug 9, 2003 (UTC)
Are there any objections to removing the vote as present and replacing it with a summary of the pros and cons of the new design, so that those of us who want to change the layout can try to address the cons, before we vote on it? The end result may then be a combination of elements of the current layout and elements of the new one, to find a solution that satisfies both camps.—Eloquence 02:35, Aug 9, 2003 (UTC)
Sounds good to me. Martin
No objection from me. Angela

Yeah. Let it go on for a while. It is giving a useful idea of what people want.

We could sort of borrow from the lawmaking method.

If there is agreement to design a new one, a list of questions set together (Committee Stage) Do you want the page to have

Finally, here is the version put together based on all people want in. (Report Stage)

And hey presto, a Bill has been passed, oops, I mean a new front page has been adopted. (If we want to be really political, we can send it to President Jimbo with no right of veto. Hee Hee!) And finally, definitely, we have a front page, not the Temp1, Temp2, Temp3, . . . Temp214, 'no, lets go back to Temp108 and resign it again' debate. Heck I knew those guys in Westminster, Leinster House, Capitol Hill, etc had to have some good reason for doing things that way. FearÉIREANN 02:37, 9 Aug 2003 (UTC) (the politics wonk!)

Design by committee? *worried look* Martin

That is what we have now, Martin, except it isn't one committees but many, each doing their own thing. What I am proposing is we pull everything together by taking a decision in stages; do we want a new front page, if we do what should be in or out of it, are we all happy with the final proposed new front page. Right now all we are doing is going around and around in circles; we don't know if we even want a new front page, let alone what we want in it, what is sometimes colloqually known as "pissing in the dark". At this stage we will still be sort-of discussing sort-of ideas for what sort-of should be on the frontpage in Christmas, with no real decisions taken on anything, and everyone by that stage bored rigid by the whole thing. Do it in stages and everyone focuses on each question as it comes up, with a definite decision taken on which we can build, the ever decreasing cirles management of decision taking, as it is known.

Where the heck is the documented consensus indicating a new vote is warranted? If this cannot be shown then I declare the "new vote" to be invalid, null and void. It is ridiculous in the extreme to call a new vote just because you personally don't like the results of the previous one. A person could do this repeatedly and wear out his or her opposition until they get their way. Very unwiki and undemocratic. --mav

I agree. Although I dislike with the results of the vote, and I could use the argument that the voting was done somehow "improperly", I believe that that first vote was perfectly fine and we shouldn't keep revoting and revoting. This will make the third vote if we vote again, although the first one really *was* done wrong. LDan 20:44, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)


Hold on a moment, Mav. That is a gross misrepresentation that is unworthy of you. We have been going around in circles for weeks. At the end of all of this, not alone do we not know what we want, we don't even know where the hell we are anymore. Some people want Temp5. Some people want change but not Temp5. Some people want bits of Temp5, some people don't want to change at all and prefer the current page.

From the figures of the last vote

In other words, no clear decision on what we want, which is hardly surprising as the question never gave a clear choice on the current page, merely yes or no to a proposed replacement. Just because you wrote the current front page does not give you the right to throw tantrums, much less think you can declare anything null and void. We are going to have this issue revisited time and time again, with Temps being thrown up every couple of days. All this vote does is clearly and unambiguously (something completely lacking in any vote heretofore) state give clear choices.

  1. Keep the current page. A straight yes/no. No ambiguity, which there was with the other vote.
  2. If change is wanted, when and what sort?

That is how professional organisations do business, not wait until Martin comes up with a temp people like, or you keep your fingers crossed that no-one comes up with a more popular option to your front page, one which was not voted onto the page in the first place. (And BTW I was the one who defended your page when Oliver and The Cunctator tried to do their unilateral thing.) After weeks of debate, we still produced no clear result, merely endless ambiguity. This way, we actually take a decision, clearly and definitively and whatever is the result can claim to have been a result of a decisive vote, not endless going around in circles. Your comments are a gross misrepresentation of what is going up and all the more surprising coming from you. FearÉIREANN 21:31, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I vote that Jtdirl learns to write more concisely. :)
I agree with mav and LDan. A group of us had a design we genuinely thought would get lots of support, based on earlier discussion here. So we had an opinion poll. The new design was rejected. We were wrong - that's fine, if a little depressing. So on to other projects for me, for now. Back later. Martin 21:24, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Could it be that Mav is worried the vote might show his designed page actually is not what people want, and that Martin is worried that people might just say "enough, leave it alone for now", and his pre-occupation with designing temps might have to be put on hold. But it isn't their decision to make, but everyone's. FearÉIREANN 22:14, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Oh stop it JT. My opposition is a very valid one based on procedure. I haven't even read the options (just a quick skim). --mav 22:17, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Thanks Mav for rushing to judgment without even doing my proposals the courtesy of a proper read. FearÉIREANN 00:36, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Nope, it's my decision on how I spend my free time. If people want to tell me what to do, I suggest they start paying me a salary. Martin
Martin, I never said you shouldn't draft new temps. But we should have started off the debate with the question - do you want to keep or replace the current main page? That is the elementary question. Everything else flows from that. The information should offer you guidance so that you don't waste your unpaid time producing a front page people don't want or don't want it at that moment in time. Everyone's time, including your own is being wasted in hit and miss temps - 'how about this one?', 'OK, this one?', 'will this one do then?' etc. With this vote you will know 'exactly' if, what and when, the three questions we should have asked at the very beginning! FearÉIREANN 00:36, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)z

I can see Martin's point - people generally need to see something before they know if they want it or not. Angela

I vote that I need help with the Eurovision articles, especially with actual details of each contest, and some help with national preselections and internal selections. O I also vote that I will go to sleep now :-).-fonzy

I vote fonzy is not allowed to sleep - show more dedication to Wikipedia. Angela

I second. Lets have a vote:

I second. Lets have a vote:

Sorry, Fonzy, no sleep for you tonight! :-)))) (Unless Martin wants to create a TEMPfonzy!!!) FearÉIREANN 01:13, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Good God staying awake till all Eurovision ARticel are finished that will take me over another year mabye even more, thank god only1 person voted for that one. :-) - fonzy

This "new vote" has no legal basis and is illegal and void. There was no consensus on whether there should be a vote and a single person has no authority to unilaterally call for a binding vote. This is a slap in the face of our traditions of trying to seek the best proposals through discussion, compromise and consensus building. Simply forming the questions of a vote is way too much power to be trusted to any one individual. Whatever the outcome of this straw poll (and that is all that it is), I will fight to make sure it is not binding. Voting is absurd and unwiki when it is used as a way to circumvent the process of consensus building. --mav 07:31, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)~

I completely agree. Anybody who wants should be allowed to wake Fonzy up or put him to sleep. Eventually, we'll reach a consensus. If we keep waking him up and putting him to sleep too often, though, somebody will have to protect him. :) DanKeshet

There are clear divergent views on the nature of the front page. No clear method was provided to allow people to decide. There now is a method. If Mav wants to keep his page he can argue for it, not turn around and tell people they cannot because he says they can't. This is the way we should have done it all along; put the current page on (which I defended and stopped people vandalising) in a full vote. Decide whether to keep it in a vote. Instead the whole process up to now has been a complete fiasco. And it is outrageous that Martin tried to take the mention of this page on the Recent Pages.FearÉIREANN 18:23, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Personal attack deleted. Martin 19:34, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)

STOP IT, ALL OF YOU! You guys need a calm-down period. :) wshun 19:11, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Jt - No-one deserves personal attacks. You don't earn them.
mav - There are enough people here who want a vote that it should be allowed to go ahead. You can't expect everyone to agree to having a vote in the same way you can't expect everyone to vote for the thing you want them to, so I don't see how you can demand consensus before a vote is called. Angela

Do we need a Wikipedia:Playground where you can all run around shouting at each other and being silly? Angela

JT, you are missing the point. I am not taking issue with the value of the current vote or trying to protect the current layout of the Main Page. In fact I think the current Main Page can and should be greatly improved. What I'm taking issue with is how the way the current "new vote" at the top of this page was created; unilaterally by you. This violates a core Wikipedia concept; that we seek to form broad-based consensus on issues that appeal to the great majority of users and then, when all else fails, we democratically set-up a vote in order to resolve the issue. But the community should be the ones setting-up the vote, not a single person. I'm not taking issue with the goal of the vote or your intentions (both good, IMO), I'm taking serious issue with your methods. --mav

Martin's concerns

Let me list my concerns with this vote, and apologies for the length. First, fixed concerns:

  1. The original wording talked of the vote being a "final decision". Fixed by moving Jtdirl's introductory text out of line
  2. First question: I didn't like either of the two options here. Fixed by adding additional options.
  3. Second question: good question, and I will be interested to see the results, but I don't think it's obvious how the votes would be tallied, so it should be, as it is now, an opinion poll, not a vote.

However, I still have some outstanding concerns:

  1. Voter fatigue: we just had an opinion poll on this subject, which was heavily promoted - and quite rightly, in my view. I feel that we should wait at least a month before starting a new vote. Alternatively, we could set a long polling time (eg, two months) for the vote, and advertise it again a week before close.
  2. First question: I wonder if this procedural vote is really necessary - I would have preferred to see more discussion of the relative merits of a competition, an evolutionary-style approach, doing nothing, or a committee-like approach, as we've not had much of a discussion on how to go forward.
  3. First question: the wording of the first option is not ideal: do we mean "temp page" or "front page"? Also, the wording suggests that we're committing ourselves to introducing the new page. I also dislike the "we want to design", since most people don't personally want to spend time designing. It's too late to fix this, probably, but I welcome attempts to try.
  4. First question: the wording of the second option is unclear: does it refer to changing the layout of the main page, or does it refer to "revising" the issue, as implied in the third question? Further "for now" is misleading: it should be "for some period of time, as determined by the third question".
  5. First question: no indication of whether this is first past the post or approval. Not Jtdirl's fault, because his proposal had only two options, so it didn't matter when he started the vote, but it is now a problem.
  6. Second and third questions: conditional on the first one - it would be better to do them seperately. IE, take the first vote, wait for the results, and THEN take the second or third, depending. This could be fixed by temporarilly archiving them until the first vote is concluded.
  7. Second question: it's all very well to say "we need X, Y, and Z" - but until you see some designs based on that you can't really tell whether X, Y, and Z will be too cluttered, or too sparse, or simply won't fit well together.
  8. Third question: unclear - is this a vote on how long before changing the layout, or how long before discussing the issue at all? Will I be "allowed" to faff around with toy layouts in the interim? To discuss it with like-minded folks?
  9. Third question: I gather that this doesn't apply if people don't support the "leave for now" option, but certain of Jtdirl's comments seem a little at odds with that, so
  10. Third question: tallying problems - is this approval, first past the post, or a median voting situation?
  11. Missed question: the statistical question from archive 2 should be revived, along with the old replies: asking why you use the front page for, and whether it's bookmarked, etc. But not until question 1 is decided, of course.
  12. Missed question: it would be good to ask people to look at the front pages of some of our competitors, and say which they find the most appropriate for Wikipedia, in terms of style, colour, etc. Again, not until question 1 is decided

I don't see that any of these concerns are insurmountable, so if we work together to address them, along with any others that may be raised, then we might end up with the community-setup vote that Mav seeks. Martin 21:58, 14 Aug 2003 (UTC)

An example of groupthink and meta:More heat than light. Looks like were stuck in status quo at the moment -- Kat 00:28, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC) (links changed: Martin)

I quail at the thought of reading all the above and actually trying to understand what I'm voting on - life is too short. So I'll just say that I like the Mainpage/Temp5 one a lot. Tannin 11:04, 17 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Oh, those pastels are still brutally mindnumbing. I feel strangely compelled to eat jellybeans now and save kittens. --The Cunctator 05:14, 25 Sep 2003 (UTC)

The Main Page doesn't look good when I use Explorer 5.0/Mac. Have a look at this: Image:Enwikimainpage.jpg -- Nico 01:07, 5 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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