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Vital Articles

This page is within the scope of WikiProject Vital Articles, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of vital articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and work together to increase the quality of Wikipedia's essential articles.Vital ArticlesWikipedia:WikiProject Vital ArticlesTemplate:WikiProject Vital ArticlesVital Articles articles

Hello, I have opened comments for Renaissance on the talk page that identifies problems with the article. If these receives no comments by monday then I will open a GAR for it. Onegreatjoke (talk) 19:10, 24 February 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

The Core Contest—Wikipedia's most exciting contest—will take place this year from April 15 to May 31. The goal: to improve vital or other core articles, with a focus on those in the worst state of disrepair. Editing can be done individually, but in the past groups have also successfully competed. There is £300 of prize money divided among editors who provide the "best additive encyclopedic value". Signups are open now. Cheers from the judges, Femke, Casliber, Aza24.

If you wish to start or stop receiving news about The Core Contest, please add or remove yourself from the delivery list.

I get the strong sense that this isn't the more active of Wikiprojects, and that the huge tranche of B-Grade articles are the least immediate pf your worries. And indeed, officially it's the "least vitai" (level 5) of even vaster number of vital articles at large. So, expectation set to "modest", but any port, etc.

This topic is inevitably going to see a huge number of pageview next month, likely getting some sort of front-page mention, as the subject does some medieval cosplay with some very fancy jewelry. Any sort of additional eyes-on with the view of at least slightly improving it prior to then would be greatly appreciated. 109.255.211.6 (talk) 22:38, 2 April 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

In Special:Diff/853061088 by Feminist's bot, classified Spork as a vital article. Is this for real? -- RoySmith (talk) 16:14, 15 April 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Appears we have quite a few cutlery utensils listed. CMD (talk) 16:24, 15 April 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Are they really vital articles? -- RoySmith (talk) 19:13, 15 April 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I think they are, at least under Level 5, which currently has about 50,000 articles contained within. Nervelita (talk) 16:03, 1 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2023 May 4 § Template:Vital article. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 05:50, 4 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

I recently listed ((Vital article)) at templates for discussion, proposing changes to help address the problem of banner bloat. The discussion was just closed by Ajpolino, who found that we should Incorporate this template's information into the ((WikiProject banner shell)) area, but that many participants were unclear about whether it should be truly merged into the banner shell template or just placed within it. This discussion seeks to clarify that point.

Here is what merging into the shell template could look like:

C

This level-3 vital article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. It is of interest to multiple WikiProjects.

Page Template:WPBannerMeta/styles.css has no content. WikiProject Politics (Low-importance) This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoliticsWikipedia:WikiProject PoliticsTemplate:WikiProject Politicspolitics articles C This article has been rated as C-Class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.  Low  This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.     Page Template:WPBannerMeta/styles.css has no content. WikiProject Sociology (Low-importance) This article is within the scope of WikiProject Sociology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of sociology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SociologyWikipedia:WikiProject SociologyTemplate:WikiProject Sociologysociology articles C This article has been rated as C-Class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.  Low  This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.   Page Template:WPBannerMeta/styles.css has no content. WikiProject Sweden (Low-importance) This article is within the scope of WikiProject Sweden, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Sweden-related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SwedenWikipedia:WikiProject SwedenTemplate:WikiProject SwedenSweden articles C This article has been rated as C-Class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.  Low  This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.   Page Template:WPBannerMeta/styles.css has no content. WikiProject United States (Mid-importance) This article is within the scope of WikiProject United States, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of topics relating to the United States of America on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the ongoing discussions. Template Usage Articles Requested! Become a Member Project Talk Unreferenced BLPs Alerts United StatesWikipedia:WikiProject United StatesTemplate:WikiProject United StatesUnited States articles C This article has been rated as C-Class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.  Mid  This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

And here is what placing within the shell could look like (note that here, unlike above, ((Vital article)) has been turned into a WikiProject banner within the shell):

This project page does not require a rating on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. It is of interest to multiple WikiProjects.

Politics Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoliticsWikipedia:WikiProject PoliticsTemplate:WikiProject Politicspolitics articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. Sociology Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Sociology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of sociology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SociologyWikipedia:WikiProject SociologyTemplate:WikiProject Sociologysociology articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. Sweden Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Sweden, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Sweden-related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SwedenWikipedia:WikiProject SwedenTemplate:WikiProject SwedenSweden articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. United States Mid‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject United States, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of topics relating to the United States of America on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the ongoing discussions. Template Usage Articles Requested! Become a Member Project Talk Alerts United StatesWikipedia:WikiProject United StatesTemplate:WikiProject United StatesUnited States articles Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale. Page Template:WPBannerMeta/styles.css has no content. WikiProject Vital Articles This article has been listed as a level-3 vital article in People by WikiProject Vital Articles, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of topics most essential to the structure of Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the ongoing discussions.United StatesWikipedia:WikiProject United StatesTemplate:WikiProject United StatesUnited States articles C This article has been rated as C-Class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.

Cheers, ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 19:28, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Survey

Please !vote "Merge" or "Place within".

• Merge. Banner bloat is still bloat, even if moved to a less prominent place. As I argued in the TfD nomination, there is only one piece of salient information in the template — the fact that an article has been listed as vital at a given level. Everything else is bloat, and would remain just less-prominent bloat if the vital article tag was converted into a WikiProject banner and placed within the shell. Meanwhile, the salient fact that an article has been listed at a given level would be buried, requiring multiple clicks to access. This would effectively doom WikiProject Vital article's entire goal of helping draw attention to important articles, particularly those that have been neglected by systemic bias (see the Mansa Musa example at the TfD for a practical example).
  Merging the tag into the banner shell would add only two words to it. That's a great tradeoff for being able to get rid of an entire banner. It presents the salient information while leaving out all the filler, and is overall a simpler, more elegant solution. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 19:28, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
• Treat like any other WikiProject (and add 'Rated Level-3' similar to 'Rated Low-importance'). Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:31, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

  @Headbomb, to make it easier to parse the discussion, I'd ask that you please follow the instructions about how to format your !vote.

  Regarding adding "Rated Level-3", I left that out of the example because I'm not sure it's technically feasible given how ((WPBannerMeta)) is set up. I'd appreciate further insight on that from anyone active in maintaining WPBannerMeta; I'll leave an invite at that template's talk page. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 19:37, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

• Merge Both these proposals are unfavorable to me, but if I had to choose, I would go with the first one on the basis that the VA status is more visible, and it also readily presents the article's level, which is also good information to have. Unlimitedlead (talk) 19:34, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
• Place within per Headbomb. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 19:39, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
• Merge to reduce bloat. The entire blurb about the WikiProject is unnecessary. No matter how good your information is, if there's too much to read, it won't be read. Frostly (talk) 19:44, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
• Pass. They both look bad; neither do a great deal to fight bloat; and neither resemble what I thought I was voting for when I supported the original proposal. Gog the Mild (talk) 19:47, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
• Place within like any other WikiProject. For al these reasons I've given in every other discussion, there is no reason for Vital to be singled out as in the first example. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:49, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
• Both. I think it would be useful to incorporate the vital status in the banner shell, and also have the banner inside the shell. SWinxy (talk) 19:50, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
• Merge:

• allows us to get rid of one banner
• lowers vertical height. Important because most banner shells aren't collapsed, so every banner contributes to pushing down the talk page contents.
• avoids the Vital classification getting lost among WikiProjects. The Vital classification should remain prominent because it's a Wikikpedia-wide importance rating; a self-respecting encyclopedia needs good articles on Philosophy, History of Africa, Prehistory, etc, and if the Vital classification has ever helped incite even a single edit to any of these "core" topics, it's been more than worth it. It's true that the level-5 classification is poorer, but let's not throw away the baby with the bathwater.

There's no reason to place within: the only valuable piece of info is the level classification. Not the rating, which will always be redundant with the article rating; not the topic, which is both self-evident and unactionable; not the a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of and If you would like to participate, please visit fluff. Retaining that stuff anywhere, even collapsed, is not minimalistic enough. DFlhb (talk) 19:56, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

• Comment. Does this mean that WikiProject Vital Articles is being effectively shut down because of "banner bloat"? I thought that having a banner on the Talk Page that clarified the most important article topics in Wikipedia (i.e. the Encyclopedia Britannica inside Wikipedia) was an important thing? Aszx5000 (talk) 19:59, 27 May 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Discussion