? : Please participate in the RfC about change proposal for infobox for caucus results. Xenagoras (talk) 21:24, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi. I would like to create come kind of collaborative workspace where coordinators or members of various WikiProjects would gather and provide updates and information on what is going on at each wikiproject, i.e. regarding their latest efforts, projects, and where interested editors can get involved.

Your input would be very helpful, so I wanted to get your brief input on whether you'd be interested in helping me to make this happen. I see a few possible options for making this happen, so I would like to get your input and feedback on this. which of the options below would you prefer? also, please reply to the brief questions below.

• Would you be interested in an idea of this nature?
• If so, which option below seems most feasible to you?
  • Create a new page/talk page at the existing WikiProject Council, where members of various WikiProject can gather to offer updates, information and ideas on the latest efforts at each of their own WikiProject, such as:
    • Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Town Hall.
  • Create an entirely new WikiProject with an inclusive name such as
    • Wikipedia:WIkiProject Town Hall,
    • Wikipedia:WikiProject Bulletin Board,
    • Wikipedia:WikiProject Water Cooler
  • Create a new collaborative page or forum, but not as a new WIkiProject, i.e. with some name like
    • Wikipedia:Town Hall please note; this page is being maintained as a user space draft, at: User:Sm8900/Draft for town hall page. feel free to come by. thanks!!
    • Wikipedia:Water Cooler
  • Create a new sub-page in my own userspace, such as User:Sm8900/Town Hall
  • Create a subpage at an umbrella-type WikiProject that already covers a broad topical area, such as Wikipedia:WikiProject History/Town Hall

Please feel free to let me know what you think of this idea, and please let me know your preference, regarding the options above. if you do not see any need for this idea, that is totally fine. However, I think that the majority of editors lack awareness of where the truly active editing is taking place and at which WikiProjects, and I would like to do whatever I can to help make people more aware of where the activity is, what they can do to help, and also which areas of Wikipedia offer ideas and efforts that might help them in their own editing activities. Please feel free to let me know.--Sm8900 (talk) 12:32, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Do we have any figures that show whether the truly active editing is taking place at wikiProjects? Phil Bridger (talk) 13:36, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

excellent question. I am tagging Iridescent and SandyGeorgia, even though they disagree with me on this topic. they have some great data on this. I would like to provide as much data as can be feasible. --Sm8900 (talk) 14:29, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

The data I have focuses at the FA level, and indicates the only WikiProject still producing top content is MILHIST. With a decades-old organizational history, MILHIST survives and thrives even with the decline in editorship.

See Wikipedia talk:Featured article statistics#Jan 1, 2020

Sorting this chart by percentage growth reveals that all of the other top growth areas in Featured articles are the result of individual editors rather than WikiProject collaboration (eg Wehwalt's coins in Business, and Casliber's work in Biology), while looking at the bottom of the chart shows WikiProjects that have fallen into decline and no longer focus on collaborating to build content. In my experience, with the exception of MilHist, WikiProjects are not a happening thing anymore.

As an example of a once-thriving WikiProject, the Medicine Project used to have ongoing monthly article collaborations, top content was showcased on the project page, and the project saw regular growth in their featured content; the current picture is that the medicine project has not produced an FA since 2015, and is not maintaining the FAs they have on the books, which all need review. The medicine project's priorities are now externally (non-en.Wikipedia) oriented.

Other WikiProjects have faded into oblivion for other reasons, while still others seem to serve purposes other than developing high quality content. I'm sorry I can't offer a more rosy outlook. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:44, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

@Sm8900: Don't forget Women in Red Sandy, I mostly agree though. In my experience here I would avoid creating new WikiProjects as they have the tendency to fizzle out. Wikipedia:Town Hall I think would be perfect, simply a place to let people know what is going on in each project. I don't think you really need a WikiProject to maintain that. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:52, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

thanks, Dr. Blofeld!!

SandyGeorgia, I do appreciate your reply and your data. I do have to disagree somewhat. what about Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red? that seems to be an exception as well, since it is clearly highly active as well. is it possible that there might be other exceptions, perhaps? --Sm8900 (talk) 14:54, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I just thought of something else. even if activity moves away from WikiProjects entirely, a page like Wikipedia: Town Hall could be a place for editors at any group page to figure out where they can help with various group efforts and tasks. so I am setting up that page, and linking to this initial proposal there. we can always redirect it to another page, if consensus emerges for some other resource. --Sm8900 (talk) 14:57, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

In terms of content produced, I have no data indicating any reason to change my analysis re Women in Red. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:00, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Database reports/WikiProject watchers.--Moxy 🍁 15:11, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Number of watchers gives a relative measure, but I'm not sure how representative that data is of participation. For example, the medicine project has about a dozen active participants. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:22, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

thanks for that link, Moxy! I think it does help to provide a fuller picture, with some useful data. I hear SandyGeorgia's point as well though. --Sm8900 (talk) 15:23, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Only 15 of the over 1,000 WikiProjects have more watchers than my talk page, so ... SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:33, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Could run Wikipedia:Database reports/WikiProjects by changes again see whats going on.--Moxy 🍁 15:39, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Moxy: It has recently been run again. See here. There is however a problem as both cols are identical. If you can fix it and rerun it, the results might be even more useful.--Ipigott (talk) 07:07, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

I would suggest just put a new tab at the top of this page, "Projects". Either we accept that organized activity level indicates the death of Wikipedia, or we provide organized activity space in the hopes that organized activity might live. (There are editors who are inevitably not going to join, as they are not joiners, just like some are not interested in meet-ups, but having places for people to go for those who are joiners or discuss ideas even if they don't join seems it would be a sensible part, if sometimes feeble, of broadest engagement avenues (see eg., Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Cities people still go there to talk)) The Projects tab should also be interpreted broadly as all events/places/writing processes for editors getting together). -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:30, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

@Alanscottwalker:, well said! quote: "Either we accept that organized activity level indicates the death of Wikipedia, or we provide organized activity space in the hopes that organized activity might live." I agree. --15:46, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Be easier to have inactive WikiProjects & related projects deleted. GoodDay (talk) 15:47, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

that would be easier??!! how do you define "easy"? the proposal here is to create a new page or other resource, where people can simply post occasional comments on what's up, and what they've been doing. it's hard to get easier than that, isn't it? --Sm8900 (talk) 15:51, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

The GOCE is still very active. (Only 320 articles left in the backlog!) I think the proposal would be a good idea however I also don't think it would be used that much... Puddleglum ^2.0 17:00, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Puddleglum2.0, that's true, this would probably not get a huge amount of usage. however, once we get consensus to set this up, the next step would be to link to this actively from various places, eg active wikiprojects, wikiproject council, teahouse, village pump, etc, in case anyone can benefit from this. --Sm8900 (talk) 17:29, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Here's a current example of the death of a WikiProject. MeegsC is congratulating WPMED on the Medicine Project talk page, saying "This project is getting some nice airplay this morning in the UK, in a piece about the coronavirus articles in the UK version of WIRED."

But looking at the Coronavirus articles reveals that WPMED has barely engaged those topics. The top five articles mentioned by Wired in page views are:

1. Coronavirus, page stats, where the top contributor is not a WPMED participant, the second-highest contributor is blocked for copyvio, and the third-highest contributor is virology doc User:Graham Beards, who does not list himself as a WP:MED participant. (I'll come back to that point.)
2. 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, page stats, none of the top 10 editors are WP:MED project participants.
3. 2019 novel coronavirus, page stats, none of the top 10 editors are WP:MED project participants.
4. 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak by country and territory, page stats, none of the top 10 editors are WP:MED project participants.
5. Timeline of the 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, page stats, none of the top 10 editors are WP:MED project participants.

In conclusion, there is one medical editor who figures prominently in the content there (Graham Beards), who does not list himself as a WP:MED member. The Wired article correctly highlights Wikipedia's strong medical sourcing policies. That sourcing guideline was promoted to a guideline in September 2008, based on the work primarily of User:Colin, and also User:Graham Beards, User:Nbauman, User:Eubulides, User:Davidruben, User:MastCell, User:SandyGeorgia and User:Nmg20. Not one of those editors participates actively in the Medicine Project today. So, with the exception of Graham Beards and the strong sourcing policies put in place over a decade ago by editors who no longer actively participate in the Medicine Wikiproject, the Medicine Project has been mostly absent in this breaking medical situation. One can examine what MILHIST does right to encourage participation, and contrast that with the direction other WikiProjects have taken. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:21, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I haven't had any interaction with WP:MED but I just wanted to make an observation. As far as I am aware, it has never been mandatory to list yourself as a WikiProject member in order to participate in a WikiProject. If you are using listed membership for the basis of any assumptions about activity then you are going to reach a false conclusion. I'm not a listed member of a project but regularly seek advice or offer advice at project boards. From Hill To Shore (talk) 20:44, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

As a medical editor, I suspect I know who the medical editors are. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:54, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

correct. I agree 110% with SandyGeorgia, but if that's the case, then that's exactly why we need some group resource like Wikipedia:Town Hall. there is currently no user space where successful WikiProjects like WP:MILHIST are actively reaching out, discussing, and sharing their successful goals and methods with people at OTHER WikiProjects. --Sm8900 (talk) 18:41, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Wow. Here's the paragraph that caught my eye in the linked article (which I'm wondering if SandyGeorgia read). “The editing community often concentrates on breaking news events, [and therefore] that content rapidly develops. The recent outbreak of novel coronavirus has been no exception,” explains James Heilman, a Canadian emergency room physician and long-term Wikipedia editor that goes by the username Doc James and has been instrumental in ensuring the coronavirus articles’ reliability. Heilman is part of WikiProject Medicine, a small but extremely active group of Wikipedia editors focused on medical information. The coronavirus outbreak has kept the members of the group busy in recent weeks." It also mentions that the article contains information well beyond the medical (which may explain the "non-WP:MED" numbers. If this information is not correct, I guess y'all need to take it up with the WIRED staff. MeegsC (talk) 18:57, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes, compared to looking at the actual data about who is editing those articles, that is an interesting statement, isn't it? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:07, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

@Sm8900: We have too many forums as is on wikipedia, and adding more will mean more places to check and undermine attempts at coordinating collaborative editing. We already have Wikipedia:Community portal, which I can see has a bulletin board down the page (amusingly there is no table of contents so one cannot link to it directly - tjhat needs to be fixed! Should have checked the source - it is at Wikipedia:Community bulletin board). Also Wikipedia:Dashboard though that is a bit off-topic. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 23:06, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

thanks, but this is not a new forum in the way that Village Pump, RFC, AfD, or CfD, etc, are. this will be a collaborative workspace. So there is no obligation on anyone to check this. Any WikiProjects who want to use it to share ideas and techniques, etc, will be welcome to do so. anyone who prefers to not use it is free to choose that as well. --Sm8900 (talk) 23:46, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I do feel Casliber has a point. I utterly applaud Sm8900 for their boundless enthusiasm and wish to see and drive forward improvements across many spaces, though a do worry a little bit about this . Finding a balance between providing helpful resources, guidance, or an ideas sharing platform on the one hand, and potentially weakening and dissipating what limited participation there is already is a tricky thing to achieve. Personally, as a participant in two very quiet WikiProjects, I am keen to know how best to enliven and run them better. But isn't that what WP:WikiProject WikiProjects (i.e. this) should be used for? I'd gladly subscribe to a newsletter there to be kept up-to-date, or to seek help and advice when I need it, or to help others. But, I prefer to see clearly laid out proposals and some Aims and Objectives that I can consider. I see Wikipedia:Town Hall has now been created, though what its distinct and unique purpose will be, I am not at all clear. Nick Moyes (talk) 01:23, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

guys, Nick Moyes has a point. this is still an open proposal. remember, the original proposal includes a number of possible options, including setting up a new sub-page at WIkiProject Council, setting up a sub-page at my own user space, or setting up a sub-page at an umbrella-type WikiProject, one with a broad enough scope to encompass numerous relevant topical sub-areas, eg WikiProject History or elsewhere, or else possibly setting up an entirely new page, such as WP:Town Hall.

the real initial spark for this idea was when I became the new coordinator at WIkiProject History. I started digging around to try to find the latest information on which wikiprojects were most active, and found there was no existing forum or page to provide an overview of that data. I eventually found my way to Wikipedia: WikiProject Women in Red, thanks to helpful data rreceived in discussions with others, but I had never heard of that highly-active project, until that point. that got me thinking that maybe we could use a resource like this. presenting the proposal here, in this manner, is simply a way to get multiple insights into ways to approach this.

with that said, though, the actual core goal and purpose here is actually quite simple and clear. I am seeking to set up a page where editors could find useful information on which WikiProjects are most active, and what they are working on. In addition, interested members of active WIkiProjects could exchange information with each other, in regards to what activities are current for them, and which methods they find helpful. this includes WIkiProjects, but also any active lower-case projects, group efforts, or any concerted activity by multiple editors at all. we have forums that address specific issues eg, afd, rfc, etc; however, this would be a community forum where we exchange ideas, and information on current efforts, eg, which are most active, what they are working on, etc etc.

someone else in a prior comment on this thread suggested adding a tab for "projects" here at Village Pump. their comment captured an important point; we would benefit from some forum, in whatever form, that provides clear centralized updates on which projects are most active, i.e. we could also set this up as a sub-page at some existing resource. my goal was to propose this idea simply as an idea, which could take various forms.

I would like to develop the idea for a Town Hall page with several people who expressed support above, and with several other editors who expressed interest in this idea elsewhere, in discussions on various talk pages. so therefore, I see this idea moving ahead as a page, based on support by various editors recently. but I am also open to other ideas on ways to approach this. thanks. --Sm8900 (talk) 02:04, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

and by the way, I am not seeking any obligatory or mandatory role for this proposed process, at all. So therefore, it has the same status as a user essay, or other similar resource; people are free to use it, to explore it, to delve into it, if they find it useful to do so. but there would be no obligation to utilize it. and of course, if there are other ways to approach this, then those are still viable to be explored as well.

the real test of this idea would be whether anyone actually uses it or not. I fully admit that, without hesitation, as that is pretty obvious for any community resource.

as you can see, I do have some support for this idea from some editors, above, but I am not saying this ideas is fully finalized already. I did set up Wikipedia:Town Hall, as a work-in-progress for those editors who seemed interested enough to express support above for this idea. I do hope to use it to explore this idea with those who are already interested in doing so. but it is still very much an open topic as to which approach would seem best to other folks here. I'm really glad to see this thread being active, to get views and ideas from multiple people on what they think of this idea, and how to approach it practically, if that is possible. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 02:38, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Casliber, Nick Moyes, Sm8900: I would put it slightly differently, there are too many pages to watchlist. How did I get here? It's because with a single watch I have all the pumps are on my watchlist, which is why I only think this is a good idea if it is added here as a tab, above. Alanscottwalker (talk) 12:32, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

One of the problems is that this town hall space will not make wikiprojects active. As it is there are two or maybe three active projects (MILHIST and WiR and ...???), so you're creating a page for..what? We also alreayd have Peer Review which is moribund. That could be worth highlighting or promoting? We've had various article collaborations, were you thinking of reviving something like those? Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 13:43, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Active, depends on how you define active. As I noted in my first comment, people still go to some project pages to discuss, to me, that seems active. More direct to your question, I think that the occasional surfacing of whatever, dispute, idea, effort, contest is going on at editor collaboration forums is likely to lead to more engagement, or at least raise the possibility. (Eg. I might not be generally interested in trains, so would not begin to think to watchlist that project, but if someone there thinks there is an important issue discussion about approving reliable source which touch on history and notifies me than hey, I might be interested if I have time in looking at that, even participating. Just as I saw this and I commented. Or if someone has something to say about reviving Peer Review, I might be interested in that if I get notice, Cas Liber has something I should think about regarding Peer Review.) -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:07, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

guys, I support the idea proposed by User:Alanscottwalker, to create a new tab at Village Pump. that is probably better for now than my own ideas; below are some reasons.

• for one thing it is a great way to announce ideas such as mine or anyone else's, seeking to build new spaces for group discussion processes.
• what happens if a few WikiProject Coordinators had a group idea that they wanted to try, and had eight or nine folks onboard? would we tell them, "sorry, USer:Sm8900 already had that idea"? of course we wouldn't. there is room for multiple approaches for this. that's what WikiProjects are all about in the first place.
• there is no guarantee that any idea of mine stated above will necessarily take off. They will take time to develop. creating a new tab here leaves the door open for any new ideas, efforts or groups who might come along later, and might have their own ideas for new forms of group efforts at Wikipedia.
• By the way, I posted notices of my proposal at a few WikiProjects, to see if i could spark any interest and response. As you can see, I didn't get much response here. I can't build this idea unless it gets some real interest from others. so therefore, the idea for a new tab is much better, as it is more visible and will be more of an ongoing resource.

let me know what you think of Alanscottwalker's idea.

do we need to create a new section to formally propose that? or alternately, should I revise my own original statement of proposed ideas, above? anyway, I will simply watch the discussion here, and hope for consensus to emerge. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 14:51, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

IMHO, less is more. Too many WikiProjects, too many this, too many that & you're making things more difficult, where you meant to make things easier. GoodDay (talk) 15:14, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

on the contrary , the entire discussion here is designed to make things easier. this discussion is intended as a positive process, where all ideas are welcome. there is no need to tell anyone here that they are "making things more difficult." I'd prefer it if we simply focus on discussing the topic at hand. I am open to all views on this. I appreciate the insights of everyone here. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 15:36, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

I think this is a good idea, a central place for editors to be. Of course we merge or archive previous attempts at this. But this is a great idea. PrussianOwl (talk) 21:04, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:CREEP. We already have several community meeting places, including the Village Pump, Teahouse, Community portal and the WikiProject Council and we don't need another one. So far as projects are concerned, we should mostly just let them wither on the vine. Trying to delete them would be like the portal omnishambles.

The main thing that needs doing is to stop gnomes adding huge project banners to article talk pages when they don't actually speak for those projects or do any real work on the articles. For example, I recently created the article Edda Tasiemka. I did this on my own initiative for the Six millionth article milestone – an activity which was well-attended but which was not associated with a particular project, AFAIK. I was mildly annoyed when some gnomes added several project templates to the article's talk page: Biography, Germany, UK and Women. These all seemed too broad in scope so I replaced them all with a couple which actually addressed the topic: Journalism and Libraries. I considered Wikiproject Archive but found that this was some sort of meta-activity and not actually concerned with real-world archives. I then squished all the templates with a ((WPBS)) so that users of the talk page would not be distracted by them. Someone then added the biography project back but I'm ignoring it as it won't now do anything significant.

Andrew🐉(talk) 21:38, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

@Andrew Davidson: I would argue that the WikiProject Biography banner serves a useful purpose on all biography articles. As a bare minimum it flags up articles as being covered by WP:BLP, or not, and places them in suitable categories. The banners are also another route for other editors to find and update the article. Your article is barely more than an orphan at the moment with a link from only one other article. If you want to keep out the WikiProjects from your creation, it is likely to sit unheeded for years after the initial rush of DYK editors have passed through. From Hill To Shore (talk) 17:21, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose, at least as proposed. This is too conceptually nebulous and unclear to be of use, overlapping with better venues for it when there's a clearer scope. Have something article-specific in mind? Use the article talk page. Need more eyes on the matter? Ask a relevant WikiProject. If it's too ill-defined to fit on a talk page or WikiProject, the various village pumps and noticeboards are there for that. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:12, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

Also the idea that there are only ' two or maybe three active projects' is plainly ridiculous. Sure there's a bunch of defunct projects (mostly those with such narrow scope, that they really are much closer to taskforces), but that hardly means that most are that way. All the projects I'm a member of are pretty active. That's at least WP:PHYS, WP:JOURNALS, WP:ELEMENTS, WP:MED, WP:WPWIR, and I know for a fact that WP:CHEM, WP:VG, WP:WPMATH are pretty active as well. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:22, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

@Headbomb: thanks very much for your great info. part of the reason for my proposal above is precisely to share info like the great data that you just mentioned. yes, we have existing noticeboards. but we have nowhere that serves as a place, a forum, or a repository, for current info, active updates, and ongoing active discussions, on activity and current projects like what you just mentioned. that is precisely what I would like to set up; statements like your are the reason that I wish to do so.

Also, please note, my initial proposal above specifically states that it would be fine if we could set this up as an active sub-page of an existing resource; i.e. this could be at WikiProjects Council, or an existing meta-WikiProject, etc. my point right now is that nothing that we currently have is fulfilling this purpose. so would you like to help put this in motion?

in your opinion, where would be a good place for this? and if you feel that this does already exist, could you please tell me which page or resource seems to fit this role? I am truly open to any guidance or input that you may have. i am very glad that you took the time to write. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 18:18, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

I recommend merging Wikipedia:Community bulletin board and Wikipedia:Town Hall

I think the overlap is enough that these two pages should be merged (i..e revitalising the former). I also think linking as a tab from Village Pump is an escellent idea. The noticeboard has not been very visible for decades. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 23:11, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

thanks! however, I don't think merging Wikipedia:Town Hall will improve or revitalize any other page. right now, Wikipedia:Town Hall is still just an experiment. It hasn't really caught on at this point. if no one uses it, it won't have much impact if it is simply merged --Sm8900 (talk) 23:41, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi. I only meant for Wikipedia:Town Hall to be an experimental prototype, but it seems to have been somewhat misinterpreted. for the purposes of this discussion, I will simply maintain it as a draft in my own user space. that should remove any hint of jumping the gun unnecessarily. anyone who does have some interest in this page is welcome to visit my user page draft and to make comments there.

here is the link: User:Sm8900/Draft for town hall page. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 23:44, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

• For the tab, we just need a one word tab title, I suggested "Projects", some might see that as too limiting but I think of it kind of indicates 'things being done by editors', I suppose "Community" could work, although it seems a bit more amorphous to me. Alanscottwalker (talk) 01:39, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

Add tab to Village Pump for "Projects" topics

As per the comment immediately above, I am adding a separate section here for the great idea proposed above, to add a tab to Village Pump for projects. If editors could please express their support or other views here, that would be helpful.

Casliber, I agree with your comment above that favors the addition of a new tab to Village Pump. if you wish, feel free to comment in this section. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 01:23, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

I have reverted (most of) your spam notices. This idea does not have support, and should not be presented as a thing that has such support, or that will (or should) happen. The 'town hall' is fully redundant with WP:COUNCIL and other noticeboards like WP:Community Portal or WP:Dashboard. Get consensus for your idea first before spamming projects. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 05:50, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject History/History Town Hall. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 06:05, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Now we're at ANI. This is getting ridiculous. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:47, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

I followed your request to make it a draft in my user space, then left a message on your talk page, to let you know that I had done so. I have replied to your note at WP:ANI. thanks. --Sm8900 (talk) 13:52, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

The request was for you to stop spamming your half-baked proposal and to stop WP:FORUMSHOPPING. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:56, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Okay, but you also requested that I present as a draft in user space. if you'd prefer not to communicate about that draft, that is totally fine. I appreciate your reply. --Sm8900 (talk) 13:59, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

(←) WP:IDHT, WP:TE. Why, exactly, are you generating such a timesink? Miniapolis 18:20, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

I think that we can safely close this now. I appreciate everyone's input. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 00:59, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

is it okay for me to archive this section? I hope that's okay. thanks. --Sm8900 (talk) 01:07, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Let the bot archive it, so all observers of this forum will have the usual amount of time to stay up-to-date on discussion threads. isaacl (talk) 01:16, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

FYI

 – Pointer to relevant discussion elsewhere.

Please see this discussion at WT:REDIRECT, about adding "not mentioned in the target article" to the list of (non-speedy) deletion criteria for redirects, since it has long been used as one at WP:RFD.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:56, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Please voice your opinions at Talk:AC/DC#Seeking page protection consensus. Regarding indef semi for Bon Scott, Angus Young, Malcolm Young pages. Thank you, - FlightTime (open channel) 23:58, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

The following 200 pages are in this category, out of approximately 378,105 total. This list may not reflect recent changes (learn more). (Number as of this proposal, 00:18, 9 February 2020 (UTC))

That number of articles would seem to be overwhelming, with human effort unlikely to reduce it, especially since it gets higher with new tags. Here are some suggestions:

1. Create a bot to work on that huge category, looking at articles tagged before a certain date, say before 2010, and checking how many references were valid on the date cetain, and how many are valid during the check, and then delete the tag if the number of valid citations has increased enough. Determining that number might be tricky to establish, so perhaps some sampling bot would be needed. I suspect that there are many older articles which would qualify for deletion, even with a increase of 20 to qualify for deletion.

2. Create a category a lot smaller than 378,000, say only 3000, with some way to select good candidates for human effort, perhaps large older articles with only a few inline references.

3. Run a contest for that smaller number for any user who signs up for it.

4. We know who created the article and when the tag was applied. A bot could be created to send a message to the tagger user, or the creator of the article and maybe only send messages to volunteers, not everybody found to have created or tagged a references needed article.

What do others say? The previous proposal shows some interest in this situation--Dthomsen8 (talk) 00:18, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Those are only the articles actually tagged as needing more references. It is possible that 5 million would be a more representative number. Another way of looking at it is that only GA and FA or equivalent and maybe B-class have been adequately checked, and that was when they were promoted. It also depends on whose evaluation for need is applied. · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 09:14, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

You are right, there is likely to be far than 378 thousand articles that could be tagged as needing more references. Your idea of starting with FA or GA articles is a good one. My basic concept was find articles with sufficient references but tagged long ago to be done first, and your idea to start with FA and GA articles is would help. I am going to look at those two categories by manual means. I wll post some findings here.--Dthomsen8 (talk) 01:00, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Dthomsen8 I've seen editors add the template when there are only a few sentences lacking a citation and everything else is cited. To me, it should only be used in the worst cases, since as Peter says nearly every article needs additional citations by default. As such a bot that can determine proportion ie. number of citations vs. number of sentences, could better determine when to both add and remove the tag. These tags are emotive in the community, any bot work would need to be balanced with both adds and deletes. I ran a bot that added about 10,000 ((Unreferenced)) which you would think would be uncontroversial but it took months of RFC and BRFA (two of them) to finally get approval, it was a big effort. The software was also not easy simply determining when an article has a ref or not, or should even have a ref or not, turns out to be complex in the details due to endless edge case exceptions. -- GreenC 16:21, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

This is running in March, sign up if you can help, there's nearly $500 work of book prizes available so if anybody needs books for other topics might help you out! I propose we run these for different areas and topics to reduce our huge amount of stubs!♦ Dr. Blofeld 15:25, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Summary

In case if it's TL;DR, otherwise please start at the Background section.

I would like to propose a new template. The main purpose of this template is to collect and show links which lead to articles/chapters in reliable sources that have additional textual information (not only data or images) on the subject, like encyclopedias, biographical dictionaries, GLAM sites, academic projects, etc. Similar to Template:Authority control or Template:Taxonbar but with content that expands on the topic and provides further reading. Example:

Background

There are many great online, freely accessible reference works, encyclopedias, biographies, virtual exhibitions which are unknown for most people or maybe even completely forgotten after a few years (academia has a problem with communication?). This also means they are not channeled in to Wikipedia (some general examples are Cambridge Encyclopedia of Anthropology absent from the Anthropology article, The First Amendment Encyclopedia missing from the First Amendment article, Encyclopedia on Early Childhood Development missing from related articles). Even if used, they easily get lost among references or a longer list of external links.

At the same time, more and more of these sites are connected to Wikidata, the ID each article in the source added to the corresponding Wikidata item.

You can check the ones that already have their own Wikidata property ([1]), the ones that are being matched to Wikidata items but don’t have their property yet ([2]), and a growing list of sites to be included in Wikidata ([3]).

Idea

To make these sites visible in Wikipedia, I would like to propose a new template. The main purpose of this template is to collect and show links which lead to articles/chapters in reliable sources that have additional textual information (not only data or images) on the subject, like encyclopedias, biographical dictionaries, GLAM sites, academic projects, etc. Similar to Template:Authority control or Template:Taxonbar but with content that expands on the topic and provides further reading.

Goals, advantages

• promote the use, presence and knowledge of reliable sources
• encourage further reading
• add depth to article stubs, help finding sources for expanding them
• make Wikidata more visible
• possibly facilitate authors of the external sites to recognise/contribute to Wikipedia
• help smaller language Wikipedias to gather content/make their wikis more visible

There are similar templates on other Wikis, these are the ones I know of:

• w:fr:Modèle:Dictionnaires
• w:es:Plantilla:Control_de_autoridades
• w:it:Template:Collegamenti_esterni

An important feature of the template would be its multilinguality. This means two things. First, that it is meant to be used in any language Wikipedias, using the same central list of sources and automatically ordering the IDs to show the local language ones first. Second, in the case of multi-language sites, it could handle multiple formatters and use the one in the local language, perhaps also offer the other languages in a bracket.

I think by having the template prefer open-access sources would not only prioritise for the readers articles they can actually read but would promote open access in general. On the other hand, as this would exclude paywalled sites like Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, probably best if they are still included but in a separate category or just shown with a lock icon next to them.

Visuals

Visually it would be similar to authority control but rather as a sidebar, located on the side of the external links section or below the main infobox of the article. Another option is to still have it as a navbox, and include it in the beginning of the external links section like Template:Medical_resources (for example in Influenza. It should be distinct from the authority control navbox so it wouldn’t go unnoticed to the reader. Still, it shouldn’t take too much space so it wouldn’t get too distracting. It could also help in taking some weight off authority control as sites in this template should not have to be included there, making it clear what purpose each one serves. It would be important that the template shows the full name of the sites instead of abbreviations (so Historische Lexikon der Schweiz instead of HLS) even if this takes more space because readers are not necessarily familiar with the short names and they would know what they are clicking on (w:fr:Modèle:Dictionnaires is this way). Also, abbreviations don’t always work with multilingual sites as they have the title translated with a different short name. Plus, search engines would show the article with the template if someone looks up encyclopedias. If the list would be too long, taking up too much space, it could be that only the local language part is expanded and the others are in a collapsed section.

Technical background

The template would use external IDs from Wikidata. By this, it would be easily expandable and translatable to other languages. Wikidata and the template would be expanding together automatically as a new ID added to an item would also show up in the template. If the URL of the ID changes (and is updated in Wikidata) the ID would automatically be changed in the template too.

In order not to get entangled with some inconsistency/lack in the tagging and titling of these sources in Wikidata, the sites referenced by the template would not be automatically generated from Wikidata but rather come from a centralised list which would be maintained and expanded by the community on consensus about what is a good enough source to be included.

From Wikidata, the template would gather the following: the ID (from property statements in the items), the formatter URL (from property), the language(s) and the title(s) of the site (from the qualifiers of the formatter URL and _not_ from statements in the property’s subject item as those are often non-existent or lack information).

To further minimise the risk of having IDs that lead to the wrong article or are just offline, the template could have a simple report button which would automatically generate a note to check the IDs for the specific item.

Examples

Obviously these are handcrafted, including some sites that don't have a Wikidata property yet and not using multi-language formatters but it shows the potential of the template.

Tasks, things needed

In Wikipedia:

• Editors who comment on the idea, help to make it better, thinking about how to make it easily translatable and available for all wikis.
• Template editors who would like to do the coding. The best would be to contact and work together with the creators of the three similar templates, build on those of possible - I’d be happy to help in coordinating this.
• Creating bots that could help spreading the template in articles.
• Writing documentation for the template with info on how to use the template in articles, what are the rules for expanding the list of sources.

In Wikidata:

• Tagging the external ID properties’ formatter URLs with qualifiers for title and language, adding missing formatters for multi-language sites.
• Submitting property proposals for sources that don’t have it.
• Matching items in Mix'n'match.
• Expanding the meta list.

As I lack coding skills, these are just what I came up with and there are probably a lot more to consider.

Possible issues

• link to encyclopedia already in article's external links
• making sure the template's list only includes quality sites
• how can the database of sites be maintained centrally if it is used by many language wikis (how do they communicate?)
• multiple ID values under a property in an item

Participants

Please put your name here if you would like to help creating the template. I'll make a separate project page if we have enough people.

Discussion

Let me know what you think. --Adam Harangozó (talk) 14:00, 23 February 2020 (UTC) (Please contribute @Nomen ad hoc:, @Thierry Caro:, @Epìdosis:, @Magnus Manske:, @Strakhov:, @Eru:, @Lofhi:, @Gerwoman:, @Trade:, @Trivialist:, @Jean-Frédéric:, @Bargioni:, @Rotpunkt:, @Bultro:, @Sakretsu:, @Horcrux:, @Jheald:, @Charles Matthews:, @Simon Villeneuve:, @99of9:, @Spinster:, @Malore:, @Pigsonthewing:, @Vesihiisi:, @Doc James:, @RexxS:, @Galobtter:, @MSGJ:)

Holy wall of text. You could cut that down by 75% easily. As far as I can tell, the idea has merit, but getting to the part where we see what it is you're proposing is an adventure in reading an advocacy piece, more than telling us what you're proposing. Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 14:24, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

So, who decides what sources get spammed to what pages? Because that is what this proposal amounts to, spamming of a bunch of sources, many of which don't seem to be reliable, just because they are free. Oppose - we are not an advertising service.Nigel Ish (talk) 14:53, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

As it says in the proposal, my idea would be that it is based on consensus which sources are added. Please explain which ones are not reliable and how is linking to mostly academic sites advertising or spamming. --Adam Harangozó (talk) 15:16, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

• (({1))}. NAH 15:20, 23 February 2020 (UTC).

• I can sort of see making sure that we have categories on en.wiki of the type "Reference works that cover TOPIC" (where TOPIC should be broad topic areas: World War I, but not the Western Front of World War I; physical chemistry but not states of matter. etc. We could then make sure these categories are highlighted at Portals, and could use a template that is presented like ((Commons category)) to direct readers to this list of possible resources. That doesn't necessarily mean they will find content about the specific topic in each reference listed but this would be a list they could start if our articles do not specifically identify any to begin with. --Masem (t) 15:37, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

• Ugh; this would be a wreck for medical content, as (allegedly) we keep our content more up to date, and often those kinds of sources are (theoretically) well behind the more recent journal sources we use. In the articles I edit, the kinds of sources we would link to generally are grossly outdated and inaccurate. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:40, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

I think medical content would no be included as it is already in Template:Medical resources. Though many of the medical articles on these sites show when they were last updated by a professional. --Adam Harangozó (talk) 21:21, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose This is the kind of navigation template clutter that burdens so many articles distracting from the core text, making photos and text alignment jumbled, or filling the bottom of articles with more random stuff. Studies have shown few people click through to external links, like less than 5 percent per page view click through to any external link anywhere in the article. That includes the highly relevant citation links, much less these random general links. The upsides of this template are not balanced by the downsides IMO. These kinds of links are better organized in a Bibliography article where users can decide which are the best online sources and can organize them while not being limited to a few dozen sources. -- GreenC 16:01, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

This seems to be about just the placement - where would it be the best? Also, maybe I misunderstood, but there is a contradiction between distracting from core text and no one clicking through them. Also, maybe only some people would use it but that's still a start for a good thing. --Adam Harangozó (talk) 21:21, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

If the template was in the talk page, which exists to discuss existing or new sources. I could support that. Also need to deal with link rot and archive URLs.. every URL dies in time 7 years is average lifespan of a URL, they will likely change URL formats as they move servers, change platforms, new owners etc.. -- GreenC 16:15, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support (though suggest collapsing the box by default to avoid annoying readers with visual spam). In the area in which I tend to edit (historical biographies etc.) the material is fairly stable and sources tend not to go out-of-date. At the moment Wikidata holds keys into reliable sources, but these are not surfaced to Wikipedia. Dsp13 (talk) 18:24, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

There are appropriate places on Wikipedia to surface reliable sources. But at the bottom of mainspace articles in a collapsed template is not surfacing it is burying. It is also clutter, as I noted in my Oppose !vote very few will click though on these links. An example of how to do it right: Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources. It includes justification as to why a source is reliable, a scale of reliability (score A+ to F-). This page is widely used and appreciated. -- GreenC 20:05, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedians not knowing about these sources does not make them not reliable - please check the actual links. Again, if the problem is with the placement - I'm happy with having it in a more visible place but then the discussion should rather be constructive about how to make it more visible rather than opposing the whole idea. Also, in shorter or stub articles they would be even more visible and needed. --Adam Harangozó (talk) 21:26, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

The Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources are about non-academic sources as those are generally agreed upon in Wikipedia as reliable. --Adam Harangozó (talk) 21:32, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

• The reason why we usually don't include encyclopedias in a Further reading or External links sections is that, well... we are an encyclopedia. People come to this site to read encyclopedic articles, not to get links to other encyclopedias. WP:ELNO§1 says: "Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a featured article. In other words, the site should not merely repeat information that is already or should be in the article. Links for future improvement of the page can be placed on the article's talk page." – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 20:17, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Of course many of these provide additional information to the article. Being an encyclopedia does not mean other encyclopedias contain the same information (especially the thematic ones). Also, IMDB does not contain any extra information to a wiki article, still it's everywhere. And any other kind of external link could include information that could be included in a later version of the wiki article. I think these things should be more flexible and Wikipedia can also be a gateway to other quality sources - it is not a competition. --Adam Harangozó (talk) 21:21, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree that it's not a competition, but we need to be sure that in each case the link is helpful. In some cases a link to a specific site will be helpful, but in others it will not, for example if the linked source provides content that has been superceded by more recent content that is in the Wikipedia article. We should not be providing blanket assurance that any particular external resource is reliable. Phil Bridger (talk) 21:52, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Phil Bridger. Interesting thematic encyclopedias can already be linked on a case by case basis under current policy. – Finnusertop (talk ⋅ contribs) 14:40, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose, because although I appreciate the thought that went into it and the detail of the exposition, it is largely duplicative. For many of the most important PD sources (EB1911, Catholic, DNB being those I'm most familiar with) editors have already put in the work, in the early 2000's, to identify them in the relevant WP articles. We already have too many competing styles, including inline attributions or simple cites, footnotes in References/Further Reading/External links (to the individual editor's taste), and sidebar posters (which are basically the same as the citation templates minus volume and page information). Citations and inline citations' related footnotes usually link to the PD source of interest, more for purposes of verifiability, but the Further Reading usage is also found in many cases. In other words, addressing Adam Harangozó's point: there are many, many articles that do already include an external encyclopedic source in Further reading; that ship has sailed. Yes, in principle we could import the entire article but sometimes there is archaic or POV, but still interesting, material that doesn't belong in WP proper.

I suggest the better project would be to create templates like (to choose the example I'm familar with) ((Cite EB1911)) and posters like ((EB1911 poster)) and encourage their use instead. If we're going to spend effort on WP's relationship with PD sources, it should be on identifying specific attributable text more precisely; a general reference to a verbatim copy of a PD source doesn't cut it any more. David Brooks (talk) 21:56, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi, I think you misunderstood, the proposal is not about public domain sources but mostly new encyclopedias.

(previous comment was by User:Adam Harangozó)... Yes, I did misunderstand that part. But I still have a problem with the inconsistency with the (several) existing ways of referring to encyclopedic sources. Especially if an article ends up with both an old-style reference (PD or not) and a new-style one. David Brooks (talk) 18:00, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose per Finnusertop's rationale. WP:ELNO is well-crafted to ensure minimal duplication, as it should be. We don't want to start competing with Google in an attempt to link to every quality source on a topic on the web. Wikipedia at its core is a tertiary source, since it's a collection of mostly secondary sources. Collecting tertiary sources would turn us into a quaternary source, and those aren't a thing for a reason. Sdkb (talk) 21:21, 24 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose- this strikes me as a solution in search of a problem. Reyk _YO! 07:23, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
• Comment - I don't like the 'other languages' sections much, given we're the English wiki. However, I suppose an argument could be made that, since English is the biggest wiki, if any language should have such a section it's this one. --bodnotbod (talk) 12:40, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose. So it's External Links, but we're moving them into a template because I-don't-know-why. And it's going to be powered by wikidata.... but wikidata is a problem so we'll use some unclear and complicated method to define the list and then power that with wikidata. I'm not a fan of wikidata in general, but this sounds like an exceptionally messy way to promote wikidata for the sake of wikidata. Alsee (talk) 10:38, 26 February 2020 (UTC) P.S. After studying it more I have a better understanding of the intent. While it makes more sense, I still don't want to try to spam auto-generated and externally defined External Links. Alsee (talk) 10:51, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

An ongoing discussion of interest to watchers of this page is happening here. [It's about RFA watchlist notices] –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 13:53, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Dear colleagues, please comment on CentralNotice banner proposal for WikiGap 2020 Russia article contest. (8 March - 8 May, all IPs from Russia, WPs only, 1 banner impression per week). Thank you. JukoFF (talk) 08:51, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

On mobile it's a real pain to have to scroll for ages when you want to close a section of the page and read another. If the section header (<h2>) stayed at the top of the screen while you scrolled it would make mobile reading a lot better. Thoughts?  Nixinova   T   C   05:20, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

@Nixinova: I see what you're saying, but that's be a real PITA on small screens. If your mobile browser supports Javascript there is a script that may work for you - it's a button to automatically scroll to the top. -- a lad insane (channel two) 21:11, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Would it? I think phones are big enough now that having a header stay in place would not be much of an issue.  Nixinova   T   C   21:17, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

@Nixinova: I'm sorry for responding so late! I speak only from my perspective - I use a very small phone, small enough that such a sticky would be annoying, but I know I'm in a small minority. I'd be completely onboard with you idea so long as there was a toggle somewhere! -- a lad insane (channel two) 08:22, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

I agree! One of many UI changes that could be made to make mobile better, but especially important since it affects readers rather than editors (most of whom are on computers). Sdkb (talk) 21:44, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Hello!

I think it would be good if you can search for deletions ONLY in a particular namespace, for example File or Draft. Special:Log is unable to do this now however it works perfect at Special:Contributions. Thanks!Jonteemil (talk) 12:36, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

@Jonteemil: that would be best done via a software enhancement, and I think there is a request open that meets your needs: phab:T185854. You may comment on that task and follow it for updates. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:52, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

When an editor wishes to first make a talk page, prior to the actual article, why doesn't WP:CSD#G8 have a time factor?

The case of "user subpages when the user has not created a user page" is on the list of tolerated exceptions- more than just tolerated, it is part of what is called "any page that is useful to Wikipedia."

I propose that a 48 or even 72 hour window of time be added to the "useful to wikipedia" criteria for CSD#G8 for talk/no article (yet). Pi314m (talk) 23:28, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

This seems like more trouble than it's worth. Why are people creating talk pages that aren't "useful to Wikipedia" and that don't have a corresponding article page? ST47 (talk) 18:08, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

Not really sure as I have never seen it happen, but maybe they want to discuss the topic with someone before creating the article? · · · Peter Southwood ^(talk): 18:28, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

In that case, they should head for the teahouse, an appropriate wikiproject, or other discussion forum - orphaned talk pages have near-zero visibility. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 18:48, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

• Question - I am a bit confused... are we talking about:

1) ARTICLE talk pages with no corresponding article... 2) User talk pages, where the user has not yet registered... or 3) sandbox pages in userspace?

All three should be handled a bit differently. Blueboar (talk) 20:31, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

I interpreted it as the first one based on the title of the thread. ^creffpublic _{a creffett franchise} (talk to the boss) 20:38, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

• Better solution - make it more explicit that the Ignore all rules policy applies everywhere including CSD. If it's in the best interest of Wikipedia NOT to nominate a CSD-eligible page, don't nominate it or wait until it IS in the project's interest to nominate it. For some G8 pages, may mean waiting the 48-72 hours Pi314m suggests. For other G8-eligible pages, clearly no wait is needed. As an administrator, if it's in the best interest to NOT honor a deletion request or to WAIT before honoring it, decline the request or leave it alone for a day or three as your good judgment suggest. Bottom line: I don't think we need to hard-code in an time factor. Editors and administrators should use common sense in tagging and deleting. If this isn't happening, we should encourage it in general terms across all CSD criteria, not focus on G8. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 16:45, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
• If there is a useful orphaned talk page, just tag it with ((G8-exempt)). -- Tavix ^(talk) 17:07, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
• I think that such examples would be very rare, but when they do occur I would expect any deleting admin to be open to restoring such a page, and then it can be tagged as Tavix said. For such a rare case I don't think there's any need to build in a timer, because nearly all such orphaned talk pages will be eligible for deletion immediately. Phil Bridger (talk) 17:20, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
• Perhaps you can explain your reasoning for your proposed change? I presume it is related to Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion#Talk:Peter de Jager? isaacl (talk) 17:42, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

  If that's the case then I don't see what purpose the talk page served before the article was created. Phil Bridger (talk) 17:53, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Race and intelligence#Requested move 4 March 2020. Levivich ^{[dubious – discuss]} 19:47, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Hi! I'm requesting a rapid grant to improve and spread excerpts on the English Wikipedia and five other wikis. Excerpts are a form of content reuse within Wikipedia, easy to use and with wide potential. The proposed strategy involves:

• Developing the necessary resources in six wikis (Spanish, English, German, Portuguese, Italian and French)
• Manually replacing 1500+ calls to plain #lsth parser functions for excerpts, here in the English Wikipedia
• Developing a user script for replacing sections that contain just a link to an article (thousands exist) for excerpts
• Using said script for adding thousands of valuable excerpts to six wikis
• Manually adding excerpts to a few high-traffic articles in six wikis

I hope you'll consider taking a look at the full grant proposal and leave a comment there. Thanks! Sophivorus (talk) 01:38, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

From many of the above comments, it looks as if wikiprojects are a thing of the past. Only those concerned with producing high quality articles are considered successful while those with few active participants are considered to be inactive.

I have a rather different view. I find wikiprojects extremely useful in identifying articles on a given area of interest, in contacting editors for pertinent collaboration and in alerting potential collaborators to developments which may be of interest to them. I can confirm this has worked effectively in connection, for example, with the monthly topics of Women in Red, with notices of contests, with the need to concentrate on third world countries/populations, and with attracting interest in developments such as elections or world conferences.

There has been little mention of the part wikiprojects play in attracting new editors but in my experience that is frequently one of the more important outcomes.

There is one aspect in particular which seems important to me and which up to now has received little attention. It is the frequency with which wikiprojects are included on the talk pages of new articles. These templates serve not only to relate an article to the areas of interest it covers but they are also a means of initial and on-going assessment. I think it would be very useful if we could find a means of listing the number of talk page templates per wikiproject added each month. In my opinion, it would provide quite a different view of the importance editors give to one of the more important features of wikiprojects.

In conclusion, while I welcome general discussion of how we can revive community collaboration, it looks to me as if many wikiprojects continue to serve a useful purpose and should therefore be given further support. But to avoid confusion, those which really no longer serve any useful purpose should be deleted.--Ipigott (talk) 08:00, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

I think Sandy is referring to the fact that many WikiProjects end up inactive or barely have a couple of active editors and that most editors have the tendency to do their own thing. I know I've personally started a few projects which are now largely inactive and I see dead projects all of the time when I send out notifications of my contests. The Intertranswiki project for instance is arguably one of the most important things we can do towards addressing systematic bias and getting content on other wikis put into English but we only have one regular contributor who functions within that project, most people work independently. My challenges are faring pretty well as a whole though, and have grown in the number of contributors. The Women cause is somewhat different in that it unifies a lot of people in the real world who are campaigning to make a difference, Women in Red has been extremely well organized and run, in an ideal world every topic would have a fully functional operation and be consistent like this.♦ Dr. Blofeld 13:55, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

The inactive WikiProjects should be nominated for deletions. GoodDay (talk) 15:19, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Sandy is quite right that many wikiprojects often end up completely inactive and I agree that they should either be deleted or completely bypassed. But many of the others serve a useful support purpose as I've tried to explain. Thanks for reminding us of Intertranswiki - I had almost forgotten about it. It's the kind of wikiproject that could be usefully revived as there is a growing need for translations in and out of English. But like many of the others, someone needs to drive it along.--Ipigott (talk) 15:23, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

I didn't expect my observation about MILHIST's performance, relative to other moribund WikiProjects (or active WikiProjects where quantity does not equal quality), to be taken as a reason to delete WikiProjects, rather as a reason to Be Like MILHIST. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:37, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

I strongly oppose the deletion of WikiProjects unless there is a good reason behind doing so. The pages can just as easily be marked as "historical" until interest is regained on the subject. See: Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion as an example of this. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 15:27, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

I just want to add that past consensual reasons for deleting WikiProjects include: Projects created by a sock/banned user, and Projects that are created pre-maturely. Keeps have been historically high for former large scale WikiProjects, and those with a lot of members. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 18:18, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Off the top of my head, I can only think of one WikiProject that was deleted, and that was because its purpose was deemed to be antithetical to collaborative editing. isaacl (talk) 21:01, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

• How is the encyclopedia improved by deleting an inactive wikiproject? This is like people wanting to clean up stale userspace pages. They may have minimal (or even, zero) value, but if they're not actively causing any harm, why expend any effort to delete them? -- RoySmith (talk) 18:31, 10 February 2020 (UTC)
  • If anyone wants to spend time and effort on getting wikiprojects deleted then I would suggest that they would get more bang for their buck by improving articles, not least by finding reliable sources. Yes, most such projects are moribund, but why waste effort on getting something deleted that nobody reads anyway? Let's remember that we are supposed to be producing a public-facing encyclopedia, not making a nice tidy Wikipedia space for ourselves. Phil Bridger (talk) 18:50, 10 February 2020 (UTC)
    • One possible benefit of deleting an inactive wikiproject is that it makes it less confusing for editors to find a venue to raise their concerns. Wikipedia has lots of dead spaces where you can shout as much as you want, but no one is listening. Removing some of these could make for a more responsive experience.
      That said, I think this is a fairly minor concern. The harm done by inactive wikiprojects is pretty minimal and likely not worth the trouble to address. --Trovatore (talk) 19:56, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

      The work done by the WikiProject can still be of use, even if the project is no longer a central hub of activity for the topic area, such as style advice and guidance on article content and format. Additionally, preserving the historical record is important to ensure that future work can build on the past and that blind alleys aren't unnecessarily retaken. Marking them inactive may be useful to set expectations on responsiveness, but deleting them is not required. isaacl (talk) 20:55, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

      That's well-argued and convincing. I never did think it was very useful to delete them; I was just pointing out that it's not quite no benefit. --Trovatore (talk) 01:39, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

      I would like to chime in briefly, just to my own agreement with Isaacl's well-said comment above. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 14:33, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

• Wikiprojects were never just about collaborating on articles. Of the two projects where I make regular comments on the talk, I've only ever "signed up" for one. Usually the best way to judge the health or usefulness of a project is to see how often the talk page has changed. Women in Red score very highly there, and in fact generates a lot of collaboration or just helping out, but nearly always at well below FA level. Johnbod (talk) 19:34, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

• Aren't Wikiprojects also the framework for how articles are rated? I don't think I've ever seen an article rating outside of a Wikiproject banner on the Talk page. Even a moribund project can still serve that purpose. Schazjmd (talk) 19:38, 10 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Yes, but many of us see ratings more often because there's an option in your gadget preferences to display an assessment of an article's quality in its page header (documentation). Wikipedia runs parallel rating systems: A-B-C are managed by the projects, FA-GA by community processes. At MILHIST we have vigorous A- and B-class review processes, but responsibility for ratings below B were turned over to the Project Bot. (Any other project that would like to use this facility is welcome to do so.)
  • In addition to ratings, the MILHIST project organises collaborations, runs competitions, provides recognition in the form of barnstars and other awards, and provides a forum for editors to receive expert advice and resolve content disputes. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:12, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

• Not all WikiProjects that are quiet are moribund. Some have other channels of communication through mailing lists, chat rooms and meet ups, and some, like WP:WikiProject Olympics, come alive every four years. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:12, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

^^this. I agree fully with this comment by Hawkeye7. on that note, please feel free to comment on the section above, Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Idea for new community workspace. I am trying to offer different ideas for some sort of workspace where WikiProjects could actively provide updates on their status, their current activities and where people can find them, i.e. in a resource and forum that could be used by 'editors and coordinators from multiple wikis, in other words to provide a shared space where several wikis would combine information and updates.

If no one finds this handy enough for easy use, then I guess it may not get so far; however, I am open to any form. method, or approach that people think might enable this type of resource to become useful. E.g, if you want to make this a sub-page of some existing resource, page or project, then that's fine as well. feel free to comment if you wish. thanks!!--Sm8900 (talk) 20:41, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Greetings, as a novice editor, I have found the concept of WikiProjects useful. Experience Report I am still in the observe, learn, and make very small contributions phase as an editor. The WikiProject I found that I wanted to participate in is inactive. I looked around and found an active WikiProject topic adjacent to the one that caught my interest. I then read about the history of WikiProjects, about reviving WikiProjects, explored the articles of interest to the inactive WikiProject that drew my initial interest. Someplace in my journey I caught a subjective, subtle, nearly subconscious sense that WikiProject’s days we're waining. Today I asked at the tea house about the topic, then I tripped into this conversation. I can't say I have a point of view. Too soon. Thanks you for your attention. I will return to observing this community in which I am new and trying to grok the culture. — philoserf (talk) 07:31, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

adding this memory of Wikipedians past to the conversation: Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-05-16/WikiProject report — philoserf (talk) 07:53, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, wikiprojects should stay. >>BEANS X2t 16:54, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

possible collaborative resources

I can see many areas where a collaboration (never a bad thing) would be important. One example would be article assessments and issues involving multiple projects. There is some bot assessed articles but I have seen where a member from one project raises the level (particularly on B-class), and then someone else raise the others to match. An issue I have is particular to a B-class article with sourcing tags or inline citation tags. This means the blanket promotions where solely to match the other articles without looking to see if there are issues. The criteria is that the articles should be suitably referenced with inline citations. I realize that many like to state something to the affect of "why not do it yourself. On articles in the areas I regularly operate I may, BUT sometimes I am reading articles, from a maintenance point of view, that may involve a large number of articles on a list. It is easier to note comments on the talk page than redirect efforts (like to researching the issue) to solving problems on one article. Also, why just demote an article, especially that has a 4 or 5 year old career tag, as if there is an emergency. An involved or topic proficient editor may "fix" the issue, without someone slapping a revert for BRD reasoning, that should not be applicable on policy and guideline related maintenance issues, and then involve more discussions and edits. Seems logical to me but not to everyone. I give more attention to BLP issues and at my age I would never get through one complete list, if I stopped on every article to assess the issue. Sometimes I am not topic proficient, and sometimes I may notify several projects of comments seeking a solution. It would be a benefit, in some of these cases, to have cross-project collaboration where diverse editors watch one page. I, in fact, read where if there is doubts to inquire at the relevant talk page or project. That is seeking uncontroversial collaboration as well as help. Nope, I don't see a down-side in this instance. Otr500 (talk) 20:56, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

@Otr500:, thanks so much!!! if that is the case, then could you please stop by the draft page for the proposed forum, and leave any comments, any content you may wish, or else simply say hi? I haven't gotten a whole lot of activity there, in the short time since I introduced this new proposal. that's totally fine of course, and obviously I will accept whatever the overall community consensus may be. However, my main thought in creating this page was that it would simply be a community resource, for anyone who might wish to use it; in other words, for those who want to use it, it is available, and for those who don't, they are free to use it or to not use, as they may wish. it is meant simply to be available for those who find it helpful as a community resource and forum.

so therefore any ideas, input, or simple greeting that you might wish to add there would be more than welcome. right now, we simply want to hear from active or experienced members of our community, really any editor who has any group idea or effort that they wish to explore, and who sees a resource like this one as a net positive. so I would welcome any input that you might wish to provide. thanks!!

* the draft page is located at: User:Sm8900/Draft for town hall page (see below for new title)

I appreciate your help, and your great positive and encouraging comments above. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 21:59, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm a member of Unreferenced articles and despite what looks like a healthy list of members is currently in a semi comatose state with little wider community involvement or collaborative efforts. One of the reasons I think is looking and clicking through the oldest and obscure unreferenced articles is enough to make you lose the will to live. WProjects like MILHIST are more interesting, broader in scope etc. I'm not sure that outright deletion of WProjects is the answer, some of them could be merged/redirected. I remember there was a big blacklog drive (8 years ago?) to deal with unreferenced BLPs so the Wiki community can come together when there is the will among enough editors. I'm haven't got an answer to the WProjects problem, many of the smaller projects get created by a small group of enthusiastic editors only to die when there isn't any wider community support for them to keep going. Hopefully User:Sm8900 efforts can bring something positive to the WProjects ecosystem Mattg82 (talk) 00:20, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

@Mattg82:, thanks so much!! I appreciate your positive words and encouraging insights.

Based on some comments above, I have decided to simplify the name for this new page somewhat. the name "Town Hall" was overly broad, and does not give a real idea of what we are trying to do. so here is the new name, below:

• DRAFT NAME: User:Sm8900/Community forum and bulletin board re WikiProjects
  • in order to build this, I will be approaching various individual editor who are working on specific group projects, to ask them what items they might like to post.
• One editor asked an excellent question; how is this different than Wikipedia:Community bulletin board?
  • this idea is different from the Community bulletin board because this would be an active forum, where editors from different wikiprojects exchange ideas and data; the Wikipedia:community bulletin board is mainly for concise announcements.
  • however, until we get actual activity there, any such features might remain hypothetical. so I will approach some individual editors, and see what they might like to post there.
  • even for simple updates, this page would be much more expansive; in other words, it would not just be for terse announcements, but rather a collaborative bulletin board and forum, so even simple updates would be more detailed, and more engaging
• the reason I entitled this "Community forum and bulletin board for WikiProjects," is to make it clear that this is not just one more new WikiProject which might eventually fizzle out; so that's why I did not name this "WikiProject bulletin board," as that would be a bit misleading.

this is still just a page in my own user space. it will remain there, as a draft, until I get some more editors directly involved in this. I hope to approach a few editors who are leading current group efforts, whether at WikiProjects or elsewhere, and see what they might like to post, and hope to make this a real resource for them.

however, if anyone here has any content or topics that they'd like to post, please feel free to come by any time. right now, we are seeking any material for inclusion that others might find helpful. so any ideas or items are welcome. feel free to visit the page any time, to provide ideas for topics or material, or any comments. thanks!!! --Sm8900 (talk) 05:03, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

• Inactive WikiProjects should NOT be nominated for deletion. They should be tagged as inactive. We should not delete the history of any once-active WikiProject. There is always potential for a resurgence of interest, and other good reasons.

Many WikiProjects are moribund. This should be acknowledged.

I propose that as a rule, new pages should not be tagged with the banner of an inactive WikiProject. I believe that patrollers adding banners for WikiProjects have been a contribution to the death of WikiProjects. Only active WikiProject members should be tagging new pages with their WikiProject banner. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:02, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

• Wikiprojects certainly shouldn't be deleted. I am not sure of the benefit of marking dormant ones as inactive, the risk is that it may make them less likely to revive when editors post there or return after wikibreaks. With a broadly stable editing community there are bound to be areas which come in and out of activity. I'm also not sure of the merit in not tagging articles for wikiprojects, in the past I have come across editors who screened new articles in particular wikiprojects at least to tag hoaxes and unnnotables for deletion. So an apparently inactive Wikiproject may still be serving a purpose. ϢereSpielChequers 15:17, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

I've noticed a lot of editors here seem to have some strange ideas about the function WikiProjects serve. WikiProjects served a different function 10 or 15 years ago: there were large amounts of interesting articles that needed creation on most topics, and at the same time, lower featured standards much more easily facilitated article collaboration of the WP:FA/WP:GA type between lots of editors who weren't necessarily niche subject matter experts on specific article topics.

The former are largely done now except in areas that severely lack interested editors, but WP:WIR is a great example that it still works for that purpose only as long as you've got a discernable group of interesting articles that needs creating on a subject matter broad enough to bring in a mass of editors. The rising standards have meant that WP:GA/WP:FA collaboration as a thing across the encyclopedia is largely dead, and WikiProjects for that purpose only work where you've got numbers of hardcore niche experts wanting to work together on the same specific articles - which is very rare, and unsurprising WP:MILHIST is one of the few to pull it off.

What we're left with is that areas have more subtle content issues: neglected corners of the subject matter that need fine-tuning and ideally need multiple editors to put their heads together and come up with a good solution that's generally agreeable to the editors in that area, new work that needs highlighting to interested editors, and a place where interested editors can generally engage with other interested editors where that would be helpful. This, although less suited to the mega-topic projects (i.e. history, medicine) happens quietly all the time in our more specific WikiProjects across the encyclopedia. It was also the inevitable evolution of the role WikiProjects once the low-hanging fruit was done and the standards rose. Given that, I think it's helpful to have more discussions about how you effectively link up the editors in a subject matter area through a WikiProject in a way that works, for what it's worth, given that many ongoing WikiProjects would be, if they were people, almost old enough to drive in some places. And I also think it's a damn bit more helpful thinking about how we can more effectively revitalise projects that have fallen by the wayside (given that, as I said, the mega-topic ones are too broad to be helpful - there are rarely editors actually interested in all of "history" as a topic). The attempts to undermine the format from editors who don't understand the role of WikiProjects for the last decade or so because they aren't involved with any is really frustrating when they continue to be an incredibly important part of keeping the encyclopedia functioning in many areas (and could be in more areas given some thought). Editors who are heading down the portal line with these need to get out and engage with editors doing the subject work more. The Drover's Wife (talk) 16:26, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

@The Drover's Wife:, I agree with you!!!!! your points above are excellent. so then, if that's how you feel, can you please come by, and help me build a community forum, for addressing these exact issues and ideas?? I hope you'll feel free to drop by! if not, that's okay too,; however, either way, I hope you will take a little time to let me know what you would ideally like to see in such a community-wide forum for projects, and what you think of our current ideas so far. Here is a link, to view our efforts so far: User:Sm8900/Community forum. thanks!! --Sm8900 (talk) 18:51, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree that these are excellent points, particularly regarding the value of more fine-grained projects and the need for more thought to what effective topical collaboration looks like on-wiki. However, I do feel compelled to disagree with the idea that article creation is "largely done". AFAICS we are orders of magnitude short of what even a rough sketch of a complete Wikipedia would look like. Indeed, I would suggest that the collapsing rate of article creation (for which those "rising standards" IMO carry considerable blame) means that we are actually moving backward relative to the only benchmark that matters ("the sum of all human knowledge"). This fact is obscured by the dysfunctional way that editors are socialized into creating an illusion of completeness by not creating redlinks or creating inappropriate redirects to conceal the inadequacy of our coverage. Almost every time I create an article, I have to run around and create links that should have been red to begin with. (One example that sticks in my mind is subscription school, a topic of considerable importance in US educational history whose absence was hidden first by widespread non-linking and then by an editor creating a wholly inappropriate redirect to an unrelated topic.) -- Visviva (talk) 22:04, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm not so much suggesting that article creation is "largely done" as much as that the low-hanging fruit is. For example, we had many city-based WikiProjects that were very active in rolling out articles on things like suburbs, major monuments, parks, etc, but faded into inactivity when all of that was created. On larger topics, all the more obvious topics that easily sparked editor drives tend to have articles. The article creation work that needs doing these days is much more niche, less likely that a particular specific niche is of interest to large amounts of editors, and harder to collectively drive through that format. For example, in my areas of interest, we can highlight creation work that needs doing, and it'll probably get done eventually, but any one niche area needing articles created is rarely of interest to multiple editors in that subject area. The use of WikiProjects now reflects this obvious development of the project. The Drover's Wife (talk) 00:27, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

I added some new features to this. the draft is at the link below. thanks.

• User:Sm8900/Community forum and bulletin board re WikiProjects

thanks. --Sm8900 (talk) 13:17, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Another (somewhat labour-intensive otion) can be to consolidate wikiprojects into taskforces of a more active wikiproject. A cetralised talkpage might be able to consolidate some of the discussion to keep momentum in the community whilst maintaining specific tagging of articles, subject-specific advidce etc. E.g. WP:Molecular Biology recently merged WP:GEN, WP:MCB, WP:COMPBIO, WP:BIOP, WP:RNA, WP:WPMP and WP:CELLSIG. See also WP:MED's taskforce system. T.Shafee(Evo&Evo)^talk 04:49, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Evolution and evolvability, I agree with that idea. by the way, one option might be to create a shared page where all such projects could discuss group projects. it could be a roundtable for related wikiprojects. --Sm8900 (talk) 02:22, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

I don't agree. In my experience, conversion to a Task Force is just a slow death march. Task Forces get deleted due to lack of use as well, only with less fanfare. A better option would be a straight merge into a WikiProject that could cover that area, or create a new WikiProject with a wide ranging portfolio, in either case allowing for growth and then a natural split into a functioning specifically focused WikiProject again. WikiProjects contain a lot of information in them - subject specific guidelines, styles, resources etc. That information should not be lost, or else we'll just find ourselves having to reinvent the wheel. - X201 (talk) 10:07, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

What gets overlooked by many that WikiProjects give access to a number of automated lists which aid the editing process by pointing to articles that need looking at, even when there is no apparent discussion going on. Maybe it needs a tutorial for the new generation of editors, rather than just deleting what they do not unterstand. Agathoclea (talk) 08:03, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

I totally agree with the comment above. --Sm8900 (talk) 01:49, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

Here, here. Invaluable! —¿philoserf? (talk) 02:34, 15 March 2020 (UTC)