Misplaced Pages

Points taken. Obviously I'm in favor of quality control, and would be glad to help toward that end. Already I regularly read through additional hooks and articles headed for the main page, even when they've already been reviewed, and make changes where I can. But I think part of what's causing friction here is that different editors have a different idea of what that quality control is going to entail. You seem to be raising a number of topics at once in your comments: how thoroughly the DYK articles are being checked; whether hooks on less popular/quirky topics should be included at all; how much context DYK noms should be required to give as to the rules of sports, definitions of technical terms, etc.; whether unreviewed articles should be allowed links in the hook; and even whether anything but the article title should be linked in the hook. And without attempting to build a consensus on these policies first, you've been asking reviewers to debate these with you nomination by nomination, often in aggressive and borderline-insulting language. I'd be interested to hear your proposals in all of these areas, but I think that this page might be a better place to hammer out that conversation than individual nomination threads. (I'd also suggest trying to break them into individual issues where possible for a clearer and more helpful discussion).Khazar (talk) 17:21, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Tony: A personal reply because your responses are still all about you and your tastes. I'm afraid I have to disagree both that your taste represents what we should all aim for, and that the Featured Article programme is a valid analogy. I do not think you appreciate what DYK is about. One big difference between it and other Misplaced Pages projects - possibly the most important - is that it has a deadline. Articles have to have been created or massively expanded 5 or at most 6 days before. I too appreciate your motivation, and of course in this collaborative effort, one must be prepared to work with others - and should welcome their input. But you keep demonstrating that you do not appreciate the purpose of the Suggestions page discussions, saying that you generally do not give a tick or other symbol. If you do not do that - or do not look at and review the article itself - you are getting in the way of the collaborative process by interposing your own concerns. I don't think that's the best way to get your objections to the current level of DYK hooks heard, and I am still saying you in essence saying that you are the arbiter of what DYK hooks should look like, or even of what articles should make it to DYK. That is not collaborative, and makes me personally less inclined to accept your judgment that we are doing a bad job of reviewing articles or writing hooks. Also, I have personal experience of working with you on the hook for my recent double nomination. I took your comments under advisement; I suggested compromises and gave my reasons; I accepted a revised hook from you - and you still neither reviewed the actual articles nor stepped back so someone else would. I do think you mean well, but I do not think you read and thought about the DYK rules when you edited them. I don't think you understand why the 5 symbols matter, or you wouldn't be saying you don't see why editors would not know where they stand when you don't use one of them. Please consider the nature and purpose of DYK. Because you are working determinedly at cross-purposes with it and in my opinion casting unwarranted aspersions. And this is an extremely active project with numerous editors looking at the hooks; I do not think a tutorial on how to please you, personally, with hooks would be any improvement over that collaborative process, which is far better suited to interesting a wide readership. Yngvadottir (talk) 17:40, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't think it's fair to just single out Tony because he is not the only user who is commenting without doing a full review. While Tony focuses on the interest level of hooks, KevinMcE focuses on the wording of hooks without doing a full review (often demanding greater context or sports definitions). Similarly, Lightmouse often checks for technical features (such as measurement units in the article) without doing a full review (though lately, Lightmouse has been adding a helpful Unit check preface at the front of the comment to make it clear it's a technical thing). They're each trying to help DYK hooks or articles but just not doing full-on reviews. OCNative (talk) 05:21, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Exactly. The featured-content processes would be ghost towns if we didn't have reviewers who specialise. You can't conduct this process, either, unless the environment is more encouraging for editors to come in and specialise. Frankly, the sheer volume of noms is troubling—it's a waterfall that has been allowed to evolve without proper quality control: the first step is to encourage reviewers reviewers who will spend time travelling through the noms picking off just one or two aspects in a whole lot, then return a day or two later to carry it through. Remember, it's a partnership between reviewers and nominators. The review-all-or-nothing idea that has been espoused here as a knee-jerk reaction is guaranteed to keep reviews superficial and totally inadequate—to further shift the quality-control process towards almost total reliance on a perfunctory, mundane task that nominators feel they have to go through for the sake of eligibility. We need a combination of both inputs, but I'm keen to end the fiction that if a nominator has skimmed through an article and hasn't scrutinised the hook for the interest factor (required by the rules), it's "ready to go".

I'm surprised at the level of hostility ("aggressive and borderline-insulting language").

"You seem to be raising a number of topics at once in your comments ...."—Yup.

"One big difference between it and other Misplaced Pages projects – possibly the most important - is that it has a deadline."—Oh, I know about deadlines. I've been roped into heavy commitments for rolling out the weekly editions of The Signpost, with a lot of humdrum fiddly cutting and pasting, fiddling; where there's a demanding and excellent managing editor (pokes at me over tiny details, journalistic misjudgements, mistakes in copy-editing—and a good thing, too), and where readers complain if the edition is 12 hours late ... not to mention criticising us for other "shortcomings". One reason The Signpost is pretty good, IMO, is because we react positively to critical comments. So please don't lecture me about deadlines.

"your responses are still all about you and your tastes"; "I have to disagree both that your taste represents what we should all aim for"—framing critical comments as "personal taste" was a defensive technique they used at FAC for at least two years, quite ignoring the fact that the basis of the criticisms was technical; almost all DYK critical comments have a technical basis. Of course there's some room to move, some subjectivity involved, but that should be worked out by interactions among reviewers and nominators. The other reaction at FAC was "Go fix it yourself and stop complaining". That was five years ago, and fortunately, the FAC process moved on from that years ago. I can see exactly the same pattern here. Nominators need to take more responsibility for working to improve their articles and hooks, and they need to exercise their skills by more in-depth scrutiny of other noms. I do believe an instruction to both nominators and reviewers is in order, suggesting that it is sometimes necessary to return to a DYK nomination a number of times to address comments. Tony (talk) 08:46, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Hi Tony, you seem to have addressed my main issue with "yup" here, so let me repeat my concern and then I'll step out regardless of response. The largest issue I see is that you've declared that several new rules need to be enforced at DYK without building a consensus for them, and you're working to enforce them on individual nominations without discussing them with other editors first. Some of these aren't Misplaced Pages policy as the consensus on this board currently interprets it. The wikilinking is a good example of this. You raise some interesting ideas about a requirement to check non-nominated articles we wikilink to, or reducing wikilinks in a hook far below the norms of WP:LINK, but rather than open that discussion here in a more formal way, you've made us respond to your proposed reforms on this hook-by-hook in reviews, which is frustrating for other reviewers and not particularly conducive to long-term policy change.

I understand that you feel a new set of rules needs to be developed, and as I said, I think it's a discussion worth having. If you want evidence my good faith, look no farther than the thread "A Thought" below, which I initiated as a spin-off of this conversation specifically to aid with these concerns. This proposal would make lengthier, more collaborative reviews of the type you're looking for more efficient (and therefore possible) by encouraging Watchlisting and longer threads for individual noms. All I'm saying is that I wish you would use this board as a starting point for your proposed changes and build a real consensus first, instead of trying to impose your new rules hook by hook. (Obviously, I'll be glad to abide by the views of the consensus in reviews of hooks; I just want us to get to that consensus first.) Cheers, Khazar (talk) 13:12, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, Tony, I understand that you think there are serious problems with DYK. What you seem unable or unwilling to recognize is that DYK is different from FAC. You keep saying you pushed through your changes there. That is irrelevant. Featured articles are Misplaced Pages's best; DYK articles are some of Misplaced Pages's newest. There is no reason to apply comparable standards or make arguments from similarity about the two. I am sorry you find my pointing this out to be objectionable. But makes your argument shaky, and it becomes only shakier when you continue to aver that we all must agree with your taste. I do see other people commenting on only one facet of both articles and hooks - but I don't see them setting their critiques up as a pseudo review or a mandatory extra step or saying DYK is fundamentally broken (that it "makes the Main Page look like a f...ing mess"). Nor do I see them stating repeatedly that reviewers are not doing their jobs. Yup, I welcome extra eyes on my articles. As I said in thanks to the person who finally actually reviewed my last nomination, you never know what you've missed. If you see hostility in response to you, I apologise for whatever my share may be - this is a highly collaborative part of a collaborative project, and I don't want to be rude myself right back. But your personal belief that DYK is broken is misinformed and rests on invalid assumptions and has long since crossed over into bullying. I am sure this was inadvertent and therefore continue trying to clarify the situation. I do apologise for my lack of expertise in the forms of rhetoric you expect; styles do differ, after all :-) Yngvadottir (talk) 14:51, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Hardly worth replying if you're going to "step out" regardless.

"which is frustrating for other reviewers"—Where? Who? What is the basis of this supposed frustration?

"I understand that you feel a new set of rules needs to be developed"—I'm not sure about whether new rules are required. The overlinking thing is long-established on en.WP. We have style guides, and if they apply to the articles, why don't they apply to hooks? And last time I looked, there was no rule that you have to link everything in sight.

Watchlisting: it's problematic that you can't watchlist

"I wish you would use this board as a starting point for your proposed changes and build a real consensus first, instead of trying to impose your new rules hook by hook." In what respect am I imposing new rules? Which ones that don't already exist?

"you pushed through your changes there"—well, no, it was me and quite a few others; you're painting me as some kind of obsessive, which is not fair.

"There is no reason to apply comparable standards or make arguments from similarity about the two." I'm not applying similar standards ... I presume you mean to the articles? But these are getting main-page exposure, don't forget. If I see obvious things that need fixing, why am I not allowed to point them out? Or is the whole point of DYK to wave through bad articles and expose them on the main page? You're being very discouraging to me as a reviewer; it's no wonder this seems like a closed shop. Don't you want broader community input into the process?

"you continue to aver that we all must agree with your taste"—where?

Oh, now I'm accused of writing "pseudo" reviews, and imposing "a mandatory extra step" in the process. Ummm ... well, what is the purpose of the reviews?

"But your personal belief that DYK is broken"—I think it needs reforming; where did I say it's "broken". You're dramatising to suppress my contributions.

"has long since crossed over into bullying"—I rather think that you are bullying me, right here and now. Where do I bully, or is bullying just your drama-fest word for critical comments? Tony (talk) 11:08, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Hi Tony, to try to wrap this up, let me just answer the question that appears to me to be the nub here: "In what respect am I imposing new rules? Which ones that don't already exist?"

• You've argued for a much tougher standard on "boring" hooks than previous consensus, I think. Obviously there are hooks that can be improved in this respect, and you know from reading over the page that you and I both work hard to do this, even if we don't always agree. But you've also said several times something to the effect of "some topics are just not DYK material", to which you appeared to receive a lot of resistance and little agreement when you first posted the statement. This is a conversation worth having, yet you seem to have continued to apply this standard to articles as recently as yesterday without bothering to build consensus for it first. For example, two days on a hook about a prehistoric mammal family, you voted to delete, rather than reform, the nomination with the comment: "Hook seems pointless. Blades to molars? Wake me up when it's over." (OC appears to have later switched the icon, but given the unconstructive tone of the statement, it's hard for me to see why (s)he did.)
• Hook wikilinks have previously followed the rules at WP:LINK, I think. You've done a good job catching some overlinking, but your standards appear to be radically more stringent than those at WP:LINK. In recent days I've seen you remove links from hooks that included the name of a director of a cited movie, the city where a monument stood, or the name of a team in a Major League Baseball hook, as well as Major League Baseball itself. Other editors have then had to come by and replace these. To give an excellent "concrete" example, two days ago you took the hook

... that the world's largest concrete monument is a fountain located in Lincoln Park in Jersey City, New Jersey?

And quite rightly and usefully delinked concrete and monument, but also delinked Jersey City, which is (to me) a no-brainer link to include for a Jersey City park; another editor had to then go by and add this back in. This is no big deal in one case, but it's been happening in many cases, and it's against the policy of WP:LINK as I understand it. I wish you'd open a discussion on this issue on this page and take the pulse of consensus rather than revising all the hooks based on your singular interpretation.

• You've pushed for removing links at times by saying that unreviewed articles shouldn't go to the main page; this is a rule I've never seen listed at DYK. It's an interesting subject to raise, but not standing policy as I know it. Again, it's a discussion that's probably better to have in one centralized place and build a consensus on, rather than repeating the debate hook by hook.

You say you're surprised that your edits haven't been received with more open arms, but if I went over to Featured Articles and told them that they were a "f***ing mess", that much of their content was regularly "lame", that they were an embarrassment to the main page, that I knew their rules better than the established editors there and had some important new ones for them too, and that I was going to start applying my new rules article by article, what kind of reception would I get? It's just not how civility works.

So that you don't feel that I'm trying to drive you away, let me reiterate one more time that I value both your opinion and your work, and I do hope you stick around. I've tried to extend you plenty of olive branches in the above comments, noting that I admired your diligence, that I thought you'd significantly improved a number of hooks, that I'd be glad to join a discussion of your proposed reforms, and that I had even initiated a discussion of major page overhaul that would make the kind of extended nomination review you're looking for more practical. I don't feel I'm seeing much good will in return, but rather repeated suggestions that I and anyone who disagrees with your approach must just not care about quality. (Take a look over the number of hooks I've requested changes to on this page over the past two months, the number of nominations I've rewritten myself for their prose and citations, or the number of quality articles I've sent through myself, and then let me know if you still think that's the case). So I guess if I had to write a wishlist, it would be that you'd A) chill out a little bit and realize there's other well-intentioned editors here you could work with, instead of an army of evil Wikigoblins sabotaging the main page; B) acknowledge that in an area devoted to encouragement of new content, it's particularly important to be constructive with nominators while still maintaining rigor; and C) slow down for a day or two to check consensus on your interpretations of policy, such as the link issue or the "boring topic" ban. I realize we may be past the point where any of these ABCs can happen, but here's hoping. In any case, I'm long overdue for that wikibreak I promised myself (five days ago!), so I'll be out of your hair either way. Cheers, Khazar (talk) 14:53, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

PS To emphasize one more time how much I do admire some of your reviewing, Tony, edits like this strike me as exactly what we should all be aspiring to here, and the sort of feedback I wish I was more often giving myself. Cheers, Khazar (talk) 15:03, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

That's a good example by Khazar, but I also think you go overboard sometimes Tony, such as I just read where you said link only the DYK article and on the copyediting comments you often seem to want to make these new articles mini-FAs. BarkingMoon (talk) 15:11, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Backlog

Queue backlog is at four now. Any mops to fix that? Preps are full. Crisco 1492 (talk) 00:31, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

(Four empty queues) Crisco 1492 (talk) 00:33, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

This seems to be becoming the norm, 2-3 queues empty for hours even most of a day, 4 is not at all unusual either.BarkingMoon (talk) 00:33, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

It is indeed normal. Queues and preps do not have to be all filled at all times. It is even better to leave one prep for reshuffling. It takes five minutes to compose a set, provided the reviews are well done. Reviews are the priority. One more (arguable) point: when the hook is moved to preps, it will sit for a few days before going live. If that hook was sitting at T:TDYK, together with its whole review, more people could spot errors. Materialscientist (talk) 00:40, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Very well. I am just worried about possible backlog at T:TDYK. Crisco 1492 (talk) 00:49, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Normal doesn't mean okay. And no they don't have to filled every minute but they also shouldn't sit empty for long periods of time. When over half the queues are empty, that is not good, we could easily end up with an empty main page DYK slot, for one thing. We should go to 8 hooks and 6 hour queues too because the noms page is getting more and more backlogged.BarkingMoon (talk) 00:51, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

You can always calculate how many hours will pass until then, and our wonderful bot does that too and posts a message here 2 hours before that happens. Adding more or less prep sets has no effect to the T:TDYK backlog, which is mostly regulated by the number of hooks/set, the update frequency, and the number of valid submissions. Yes, the switch to 6 hour update was forthcoming (248 noms at T:TDYK at the moment, and the tendency is to grow). Any objection to the 8→6 hr change? Materialscientist (talk) 00:58, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

What about 7? Seems we just changed from 6 to 8 a couple weeks ago. Crisco 1492 (talk) 00:59, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

(EC) Six is good. Crisco 1492 (talk) 01:02, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

We did. Six hours and 7 hooks is not good. I thought it was a mistake to go to 8 hours and I'd just "arrived" so I didn't say anything. We should go to 8 hooks too. I didn't say increase the number of prep sets. One of the big problems I see is hooks sitting on the noms page for weeks due to people arguing about wording, which is better etc. The longer it goes on and the more there is to read, the more likely reviewers will just ignore it, exacerbating the situation. The bottom line is the amount of time it takes to get a 'new' hook on the main page is ridiculous, sometimes almost a month. BarkingMoon (talk) 01:05, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Adding new sets to prep areas will not make the update faster. As to phrasing - we do regularly feature grammar errors and just odd and incorrect hooks. Many promotions simply rely on the green tick. The pressure from outside the project is to feature less, but of higher quality, whereas we tend to promote anything borderline that fits to our basic criteria of length and novelty, no matter what is written in the hook and the article. Materialscientist (talk) 01:10, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Again, I never said make more prep sets, I said 1) rotate the queues every 6 hours and 2) put 8 hooks in a set. The problem is that people don't agree on what is quality, or what is the best phrasing, or what is quirky, or how anally we should interpret the rules. See the DYK nom on "Black Bishop". BarkingMoon (talk) 01:16, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, a problem has developed recently of unending discussion on the suggestions page that is not moving toward a review of the article. Discussion on that page needs to focus more on whether the article is ready and if not, how to get it ready. See my response in section above. Yngvadottir (talk) 16:00, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

<indent>We change the update interval not because of the number of submissions, but because of the tendency in numbers - when it is falling, we may end up with a few dozen suggestions half of which are on buildings (happened before). Our rules are guidelines, and the reviewer is not a robot to mechanically apply them and to deem the nom (un)acceptable - xe can request improvements wherever the article shows signs of major incompleteness, grammar and referencing problems, NPOV, etc., and this contributes to a quality review. Materialscientist (talk) 01:26, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

That doesn't address my issues, but eh, I'm a nobody here so I'll move on. BarkingMoon (talk) 01:31, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Great discussion, but is there an admin who can deal with it presently?--v/r - TP 01:37, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

I'll get back to queues in an hour or two. A quick scan of half of the hooks: The Marjan Bojadziev article and hook read like a resume (prep4). I don't get the quirkiness of the last hook in prep4 (perhaps because of my ignorance in the basketball tournament rules - the volcano hook reads quirkier to me). First 3 hooks in prep3 are all on Africa. The lead in prep1 is marginally Ok but spreads on too many facts instead of concentrating on some (more) essential. Troy Yocum (prep1) was trying to set a Guinness record in what? "the skeleton of the last Bosnian king ... currently lies in the Franciscan monastery of Saint Luke, Jajce" is very intriguing, but its references are somewhat old, and is it really lying open in the monastery, right now? Materialscientist (talk) 02:02, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

As I built prep 4, I will say that I found a team winning roughly 94% of their games and not going to a tournament quirkier than a video game designer drawing inspiration from nature. As for the others, don't know. Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:13, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

The Yocum one is for marathon drumming, but the prep is protected so I can't add that. Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:17, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Removed protection which was set up elsewhere. Materialscientist (talk) 04:06, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Fixed the Yocum one. Crisco 1492 (talk) 07:06, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Main image nominated for deletion

I have recently nominated an article written by someone else, but I noticed a detail that I overlook: the image used in the article is nominated for deletion. I mean, I did realize it, but I forgot to consider the relation between both things (it was a busy day). The article itself seems right, the problem is just with the image's licence. I did not propose it as hook image, but what should I do with the image in the article? Leave it there while the discussion is going on, or remove it and restore it to the article in the case it survives the nomination? Cambalachero (talk) 02:38, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

It depends on the problem with that image. It would help if you specified the image and the article. Materialscientist (talk) 02:41, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

5 queues open?

Uhh, I heard 3 is bad, 4 is worse, but what about if 5 queues are open?--v/r - TP 00:35, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Gentlemen, it takes 1 minute to update a set from preps; the bot will warn 2 hours in advance if the next queue is empty; last update happened just 30 min ago; at least 2 hooks in prep1 have problems indicated above (haven't checked others yet). In short, I am seeing too many reminders recently :-) Materialscientist (talk) 00:40, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)My bad, just wanted to make sure.--v/r - TP 00:41, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Notification of Tfd

Adding notification that Template:In use is up for discussion. Calmer Waters 05:29, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Here is a more direct link to the discussion underway. - Dravecky (talk) 23:54, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Clear the old noms effort

I'm going to begin a personal effort to clear the old noms as much as possible. By old I mean ones in the red zone. There are currently SEVEN DAYS of noms in the red zone. May 29 is in the worst shape as it has 14 noms and only 2 approvals. The whole set is full of stalled discussions, pending alt proposals vastly different from the original, etc. Any help would be appreciated. As a side note, when I build prep sets I try to concentrate on the older noms. Thanks to all in advance. BarkingMoon (talk) 21:15, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

One (May 25) was approved right away, but while it was sitting there a new article was created and the hook tweaked, no more. I told the first reviewer and the queue discussion, nothing happened. Now it's taken care of. A little late for a May festival, smile. Thanks for volunteering! Should I address you in such a case? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:15, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Sure, post on my talk page is probably best. By the way, you do great music article work Gerda. BarkingMoon (talk) 22:44, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

You read my mind about Harte, thank you! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 05:42, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm trying to clear a few that seem to lost in the queue also. Thanks for pointing this out, Barking. Cheers, Khazar (talk) 13:57, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Ok, just took care of or moved along 8-10. Amazing how many are still left. Khazar (talk) 16:25, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks to all who posted here and those who are helping on the noms page too. I plan to make this a regular review of mine as my wiki time permits.BarkingMoon (talk) 16:35, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

No problem. If you get a chance in the next few days, Barking, I'd love your eyes on Crisco's and my June 2 hook for Ahmed Taufik and Tomy Wimata. As a doublehook dealing with sensitive BLP issues (it's literally about a libel case), it could use a good reviewer. Cheers, Khazar (talk) 16:43, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Commented there. Easy fixes. BarkingMoon (talk) 21:51, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Barking! Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:14, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I've taken care of another 5. Crisco 1492 (talk) 06:21, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Many thanks again to all. I feel we're making real progress. BarkingMoon (talk) 13:27, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Got about five more today, now I'm off to dinner with the wife. Cheers, Khazar (talk) 21:25, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Reverting on Yellow-crowned Bishop photo

Snowmanradio and Chienlit keep trying to insert an unprotected image from commons into this lead DYK article being used with its picture. BarkingMoon (talk) 21:43, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

he just did it again. He doesn't understand. He's been around for ages and should know better. So an unprotected image is on the main page again. I'm bowing out otherwise someone would accuse me of edit warring.BarkingMoon (talk) 22:04, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, I backed you up there. Hope I did not do wrong but you sound as if you know what you are doing. betsythedevine (talk) 22:12, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you.BarkingMoon (talk) 22:13, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

We protect images which are featured on the main page, protection of images (or their cropped/wider versions) in the linked articles does not matter. Materialscientist (talk) 22:15, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

THe commons version they keep inserting is not protected on commons. And what's linked articles got to do with this particular issue? This article is the lead dyk right now.BarkingMoon (talk) 22:22, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Am I missing something? They are trying to insert and uncropped version into the article, isn't it? The only requirement for protection is for images which you see on the main page directly, what happens in the article is a matter of routine vandalism control. In other words, click the image on the main page, try to alter it and save (add some invisible symbol) and if you succeed, go get an admin asap, otherwise, its Ok :-) Materialscientist (talk) 22:26, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

See edit history of image. This administrator is not on line at the moment to ask. It seems that he accidentally gave the small image that is going to be shown on the main page for the DYK the same name as the file in the infobox. This has the effect of showing the small image in the infobox (somehow the en wiki version takes preference over the commons version) and this looks silly. I and another user put a large image in the infobox from commons (with a different name) to look better. It really needs an administrator to fix, because the files are protected - the small image should be given a new name and this name of the small file used in the main page. When the old small image on en wiki is deleted then the proper sized image from commons will be shown in the infobox. Snowman (talk) 22:33, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

• File:Euplectes afer -Lake Baringo, Kenya -male-8 CROP.jpg - small image on en wiki
• Commons:File:Euplectes afer -Lake Baringo, Kenya -male-8 CROP.jpg - large image on commons

Me and another user are trying to but a full size image in the infobox. Alternately, the file on commons can be renamed, and shown in the infbox. Snowman (talk) 22:32, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm staying out of this now, no comments/edits at all. I wish I'd never gotten involved in WP:BIRD.BarkingMoon (talk) 22:39, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Gentlemen/ladies, please try to understand the mechanism of image protection - this could happen with any topic, not just birds. Only administrators can upload images from commons to en.wiki, "covering" up the commons image, and we do that to implement protection. Usually we copy, and sometimes we crop/enhance the image in the process, but this is not what has happened here - the image was already cropped. You are fighting about two different versions of one image. One (cropped) is featured on the main page; it is protected and you can do nothing about it until its gone off the main page (then the protected copy is deleted by the bot and you get access to the original version). It does not matter (for main page matters) which version is in the article (well, we have a requirement that the featured image should be present in the article in some form). Materialscientist (talk) 22:46, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

It does make a difference that the minute image is in the infobox, because it looks too small, and hundreds or thousands of viewers will see it when its DYK comes up. Actually, the version to be shown on the main page (the one currently in the infobox) is not a cropped version, is it a miniaturised image and it is masking the full size image (a cropped version of an image) in the infobox. This miniature image arises form a cropped image on commons, which in turn arises from an uncropped version, which is also on commons. Me and another user were trying to put the uncropped version in the infobox. This fits the requirements, because the version on the main page for the DYK originally came from this image. The article will look better for its big DYK moment with this uncropped version in the infobox. This still needs fixing, so can an administrator fix the file name of the miniature version or put the uncropped version back in the infobox as two editors were trying to do? Snowman (talk) 23:02, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

"Miniaturization" was a human error during upload from Commons. Corrected. Materialscientist (talk) 23:23, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

(ec)Having apparently been part of the problem here by making a requested edit without understanding the issue, I hesitate to jump in again and revert myself since I still do not understand what is happening. If somebody who actually knows what is up would put the right image into this article, let me flag this edit of mine as a possible problem, and one that is still the article's current version. Abashedly yours, Betsy betsythedevine (talk) 23:27, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

I see. Miniaturization was the mistake. It is understandable that this problem has caused confusion. Only an admin could do something with the protected page, and I am glad it has been fixed. I think that showing the uncropped image in the article infoxbox was practically the only thing an non-admin could do to temporarily improve the appearance of the article in preference to showing the miniature image that was here by mistake. Snowman (talk) 23:55, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

I hope everyone likes the photo of this bird, and I am glad it is being shown properly now. It is one I uploaded from Flickr and one taken by a photographer that kindly gives his images Wiki-friendly licences. Snowman (talk) 00:01, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

DYK rules: queries

I've gone through the rules, copy-editing here and there. I hope I've made no substantive changes to the meanings. Below, I've listed queries I didn't deal with in the text. The only one that concerns practice, beyond mere textual expression, is the reviewing-other-noms requirement.

IMO, the expression of the rules could be reduced a bit to convey the same meanings (i.e., they are unnecessarily long). Why not remove almost all of the bold aside from titles and subtitles? It really makes it look messy, and bleaches the function of highlighting. I do not believe readers end up taking any notice when so much is bolded.

I hope the surface copy-edits and these queries are helpful. Feedback from editors who know the process better would be most welcome.

• "If an article is linked to at ITN but not the featured ITN article, it is still eligible for DYK."—This is unclear. Does it mean "If an article has been linked from ITN but not as a featured ITN article, ..."? As currently worded, it could mean an article linked from any article that is linked in an ITN article. Surely that's not the meaning. And it does mean "ever before", not "right now", yes?
• "Articles must have a minimum of 1,500 characters of prose"—Shouldn't all character measurements specify "including spaces"? Such explicit specification is common: let's be clear about it.
• "Cited hook – The nominated hook must contain a fact cited in the article. (See more information under The hook, below.) The fact should have an inline citation, and the article in general should use inline, cited sources." This subsection lead seems to be repeated in the subsequent points. Why not remove all but the title so that editors need read the information twice within 10 seconds?
• I removed the "in particular" from the NPOV point, since all of the points are very important, aren't they? Why are the others demoted by not having "in particular"?
• "please review another editor's nomination"—is the intention that both article and hook be reviewed to satisfy this requirement? If so, could it be explicit? I'm finding that most such reviews are far from thorough ... in fact, this seems to be treated as a perfunctory job by many nominators. Just writing "Reviewed blah nom" is all too easy, without even a critical comment.
• I removed "Uncited and poorly cited articles will not be chosen." at the end. This is already dealt with, and counts as bloated text IMO. Editors are expected to read the rules, which should not have to state things twice (or three times).

Tony (talk) 06:56, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

• "and the first sentence should end with a question mark."—I've never seen a hook of more than one sentence. Why is this indicated here? (My italics)
• "The hook itself should be concise: fewer than about 200 characters, including spaces. While 200 is an outside limit,"—First it says "about"; then this is described as "an outside limit", which looks hard-and-fast. Which is it? A firm limit (I would prefer this), or a little fuzzy? Also, concision is different from length: a 140-character hook can be flabby (this could be clarified by saying "... concise and be fewer than ...".
• This is repeated under "Hook", after it has been dealt with under "Selection criteria". Why the repetition? Editors should expect the rules to be as concise and well-organised as DYK hooks and articles. "The "Did you know?" fact must be mentioned in the article and cited with an inline citation. Also, can we get rid of the speckled bolding in the text? Links are not supposed to bolded, to start with, in normal text such as these rules.
• "Shorter hooks are preferred to longer ones, as long as they don't misstate the article content."—The logic is weird. Why not bin after the comma?
• "try to avoid selecting your own suggestions"—what are "suggestions"? The word is used in two successive points: seriously, I don't know what it refers to.
• I removed "please": suddenly we're being polite after all of those musts and do nots? Better not to swerve the tone, don't you think?
• Should the rules on images warn nominators that an accompanying image will not necessarily be used, since only one image per set is allowed?
• "If there are no suggestions with appropriate images, you can usually use a flag for a topic with a national connection."—Really? A bit desperate.
• "Sounds ... should have similar qualities to pictures"—unclear. There's no corresponding requirement for vids. The section title "Images" belies these points; why not "Accompanying files", or something like that? Tony (talk) 07:45, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I'll have a go at answering a few of those Tony...

• My interpretation of the ITN rule is, as you say, that any article which has ever been a featured ITN article (i.e. has appeared in bold in the main page section) is not eligible. I suspect however that this would be relaxed if an article under went a large expansion after a number of years, much like 2nd DYKs for the same article are allowed
• I think the minimum of 1,500 characters of prose rule doesn't mention spaces as it allows some wriggle room for the "In practice, articles longer than 1,500 characters may still be rejected as too short, at the discretion of the selecting reviewers" rule. An article that's bang on 1500 when all spaces are included may well be rejected as too short. I'd say combining the two rules and adding "including spaces" is the solution.
• A note that not all images will get used is sensible. The use of a flag is only appropriate when we are "A bit desperate" a lot desperate.
• "your own suggestions" are any hooks you've nominated, the clue is in the navigation template which refers to Template talk:Did you know as suggestions, but this could be clearer.
• Reviews... it should be stated that the article needs looking at beyond its compliance with DYK rules but we can't expect everyone to be an ace copyeditor so it will never be perfect
• I'm all for any removal of repetition, the rules are far too long winded as they stand and could be quite intimidating to a new user when they are actually quite simple - Basement12 (T.C) 08:48, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

If we're looking at re-wording the rules, this would be a good time to add to the review requirement the point suggested above: that if you make the first comment on someone's hook, you should also review the article and hook for whether they meet the DYK criteria? Also, I'm starting to see people requiring nominators to review two articles if it's a double nomination. This is not how the quid pro quo requirement has been interpreted in the past; if it's changed, that should be put into the rule. And if not, it should be made clear that the requirement is one review per nomination. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yngvadottir (talk • contribs) 13:08, 9 June 2011 UTC (UTC)

Great job improving these rules! I was also looking at Misplaced Pages:Featured_article_criteria, and suggest we add this to ours: "stable: it is not subject to ongoing edit wars." betsythedevine (talk) 13:34, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

• The meaning of the ITN rule is that articles featured at ITN, now or at any time in the past, are not eligible for DYK, but articles that were merely linked from ITN may be eligible (assuming they meet normal DYK requirements).
• Regarding the readable prose length, I don't think its necessary to state that spaces are included -- they are characters, after all -- but since it doesn't change the meaning, I don't object.
• No problem to remove the redundancy after "Cited hook".
• I agree that reviews and the reviewing requirement need to be more clearly stated. The requirement is a complete review, which includes reviewing both the hook itself and the relevant article. At one time I was working on a DYK reviewing guide (draft at User:Cmadler/sandbox/DYKreviewguide) and others are welcome to pick this up and run with it.
• Although exceedingly rare, multiple sentence hooks have been used.
• I agree that the item on hook length should state that the hook should be no more than 200 characters (with an exception for multi-article hooks) and that the hook should be concise.
• "Try to avoid selecting your own suggestions" refers to nominations, but should be stronger: "Do not select..."
• I agree with your suggestion to add a warning that accompanying images will not necessarily be used.
• The item about using a flag if there's no appropriate image can probably just be removed.
• The proposal requiring the first commentor to do a full review is still just a proposal; more discussion is needed before it's added to the rules.
• We have had lengthy debates about whether the review requirement would be article-for-article or hook-for-hook. Established consensus is hook-for-hook, regardless of how many articles are in either hook.
• I agree that articles should not be subject to ongoing edit wars, but I'm afraid that a further requirement for stability might directly contradict DYK's purpose in highlighting new content; if the content is new, I don't know how it can be said to be stable. cmadler (talk) 16:22, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

• Good responses. Thanks. Tony (talk) 10:11, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Antwerp Diamond Heist

The Template talk:Did you know#Antwerp Diamond Heist nom is being held up. I don't understand. Apparently the refs are still unacceptable. I've done lots of DYKs with refs done with Reflinks. This is the first time I've heard it's not allowed. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:33, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

You used a wrong reflinks mode which adds titles only - better add sources and dates. You could fix that in the "interactive" mode, "and Plain links" (3). There was one duplicate and dead link, which you could fix with wayback machine, and one googlebooks link which is better to format with this tool. Fixed all that. Materialscientist (talk) 09:42, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Where have you been all my life! Why didn't anybody tell me about this tool??? Wayback is kept way back from the great firewall. Too bad. Thanks for the tip on interactive mode in reflinks. I had just posted on your talk, but you beat me to it here. If you go any faster, you'll travel backward in time. You are awesome x10 Thank you! :) :) :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 09:50, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Will this meet the criteria?

I decided to create the article Imagine No Malaria only to find that it had already been created. It has been mostly untouched since moving to the mainspace and currently had 277 characters when I first viewed it. I do not know if I will be able to improve the article to the quality of a DYK article within the five day timeframe. If I edit the article in User:Ryan Vesey/Imagine No Malaria, then copy the new text over, will I meet the guidelines? Ryan Vesey (talk) 21:57, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Not at present as per DYKcheck it's only a 2x expansion. Also, don't wholesale copy a sandbox to an existing article, better to move it in sections. I'm sure someone else can explain the intricacies better than I can. BarkingMoon (talk) 22:08, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

I didn't mean at present. I meant, if it takes me ten days to edit in my sandbox, and I move it over, meeting all other requirements. Will it still be considered a fivefold expansion within the time allotted? Otherwise, I would prefer to make the changes on the page. Ryan Vesey (talk) 22:12, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it would count, because 5x expansion is not calculated from the date you started working on your sandbox, it's counted from the date the material reaches mainspace. Hypothetically, if the article were 277 characters now and you spent a year working on it in mainspace, then moved the material to the article after a year, expansion would still be counted from that single edit. So, given the article's current state, all you need to do is get a sandbox version up to about 2500 characters (I'm counting 525 characters in the current version) as quickly or slowly as you like, then move it over in one edit.

As for BarkingMoon's advice regarding moving the sandbox to the article, to the best of my knowledge it has long been common practice to copy an entire sandbox over in a single edit, and I have never before heard any rule or guideline suggesting that the sandbox copy must be moved over in a piecemeal fashion. rʨanaɢ (talk) 22:23, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

One problem in longterm sandbox edits is if you copy in a single move, you wipe out everything changed since you started in your sandbox. Most of the edits made in mainspace would be legit and you'd have to account for that before moving it over. Also, the biggest problem in sandbox editing is if you let other users edit the sandbox and then move stuff over, the GFDL rights are lost and a history merge would need to be done, so best not to let anyone edit your sandbox. BarkingMoon (talk) 22:31, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but attribution only matters if multiple editors have edited the sandbox article, which is not usually the case and which for the time being does not appear to be the case with this article; in any case, pasting over the article one section at a time as you suggested would not solve the problem in that situation anyway. In that situation, a better solution is to perform a history merge. In the more common situation where a single editor is the only one who has written the sandbox content and doesn't care about the individual diffs from that process, it's best just to paste over the whole sandbox in a single edit, essentially lumping all those diffs into a single diff in the article history which serves as the attribution to that editor. There is no requirement that every individual diff from that editor's revision be accounted for.

Anyway, the short answer for Ryan Vesey is yes, the sandbox editing will satisfy the DYK requirements and yes, it is acceptable to paste the sandbox over directly when it is ready. rʨanaɢ (talk) 22:38, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

In response to worries about edits to the mainspace while I am working in the Sandbox: First, this page has very few edits, so the chance is unlikely. Second, if I were to find a change that wasn't accounted for in my new edit I would A) Include the change in my edit and B) Contact any editor involved. Thanks for the advice :) Ryan Vesey (talk) 23:05, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

5 queues are empty

Five of the six queues are empty. Maybe we could get more admins helping at DYK.BarkingMoon (talk) 01:05, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Serious question: is this caused by my comments—somehow slowing down the process? Or is it a fairly frequent problem? Tony (talk) 10:44, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

This was neither caused by your comment, nor is a problem - the preparation areas are regularly filled these days thanks to a few hard-working editors, and uploading them to queues takes a minute. Materialscientist (talk) 10:54, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Please, once the preps are up, consider to fill them with the 3 Special occasion noms for 12 June, two of them pictured, yes one of them mine, thank you. - Looking closer: the debate between summer and winter could certainly take place any day, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:32, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Prep 4 Summer where?

Summer where? That is my question looking at the pic of the lead hook, which talks about Sumer. The pic looks like summer in North America or Europe. I would say "inappropriate", if that term had not been used too much in a recent discussion here. - Also: Hans Vogt, nominated in May with the Maifestspiele (May (!) Festival), finally made it to a queue, q1, to appear when it is night in Europe. That's appropriate, if May should be hidden in June, smile, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:26, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, that (summer pictured) made me smile :-). Yes, I won't use it as a lead. Materialscientist (talk) 09:38, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Athenaeum, Virginia, 10 June entry

I tried to enter Athenaeum, Virginia, but for some reason, it's not appearing like it should. Can someone help with that please? Thanks! Divide et Impera (talk) 14:29, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Queue 6

Lulz Security in Queue 6 has been redirected to LulzSec. Could an admin fix the hook in Queue 2 6? Crisco 1492 (talk) 16:48, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Fixed redirect. What needs fixing in Q2? Materialscientist (talk) 01:00, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Oops. I thought I got all those (I had written the wrong number). Thanks for getting it. Crisco 1492 (talk) 01:10, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

A thought

One thing that frustrates me in working on the T:DYK page is its massive structure, which makes it difficult to navigate and track changes. Has it ever been proposed to break the nominations into subpages per AfD, GAN, etc.? While this would slow the ability of editors to skim through multiple nominations, it would make it significantly easier to track individual threads, some of which have been pretty lengthy the past two weeks. It would also remove the burdensome step of notifying nominators/creators/reviewers every time their response is requested, as they could simply track the page for their nom. I find it very tiresome, too, to have to check my nominations on the page every day to make sure no one's added a comment without notifying me, since it's hard to search reliably enough through the history.

I don't know how feasible this plan would be, but I wanted to throw the idea out there and see if more experienced DYKers had any thoughts. Khazar (talk) 17:34, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

It also takes forever to load and save an edit at T:TDYK.BarkingMoon (talk) 17:39, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Oh, good. I almost said that, too, but I was worried it was just my crummy laptop. Khazar (talk) 17:53, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

It's been proposed a number of times, and even acheived consensus in favor last November () but has never been implemented. (At that time, implementing the quid pro quo requirement that nominators also review hooks was given priority in implementation.) My personal preference is for each nomination to have a sub-page, which could then be transcluded in any number of ways: chronologically (similar to the current page), topically, etc. It will make following individual threads easier, will fix the problem that some (many?) of us are experiencing with load times, will largely do away with edit conflicts, and will create a more-accessible record of previous DYK nomination discussions. Let's talk about how to make this happen. cmadler (talk) 18:05, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I do remember the idea of switching to an AfD-like transclusion being tossed around. IIRC, the main concerns were that it would make adding a nom a little more difficult (creating the subpage, then transcluding it), and that IPs wouldn't be able to nom without assistance (since it would involve creating a page.) Those might not be big deals, though. 28bytes (talk) 18:18, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Can anyone recall an IP user ever nominating a hook? I can recall perhaps one or two occasions when an editor came across an article that had been expanded by and IP and nominated it, but I don't recall ever seeing an actual nomination by an IP editor. cmadler (talk) 19:10, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

They do occasionally (I know I've moved a couple into prep where an IP was credited), but that won't be an issue if we go the bot route below. 28bytes (talk) 19:12, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

The page length is an issue. However, if we used substitution, would we start archiving nominations? Crisco 1492 (talk) 18:10, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd be pro-archive. Khazar (talk) 18:31, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Thinking about it some more, it might be possible to implement this, AfD-style, with a bot. Let nominations happen the way they do now, and a bot will periodically grab the new nomination, create a page to put it in, and transclude it. It could add an "Add this nomination to your watchlist" link at the top of each one. This could essentially happen behind the scenes and not require nominators to do anything differently, while providing them with the ability to watch individual nominations. 28bytes (talk) 18:28, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

So if others are at least interested in this, what's the next step, then? Should I attempt to formulate a formal proposal for a support/oppose vote here? Or should we investigate the programming end of this first, and then come back to make a formal proposal for an up/down vote? Khazar (talk) 18:33, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I think the programming end would be pretty straightforward. Shubinator is obviously the expert on DYK bots, so I'll defer to him, but if he's not got the time for it I can pitch in with bot help. The only real thing that would change from an "end-user" point of view would be the addition of the ability to watch individual threads. When building a prep set, you'd just remove the {{Template talk:Did you know/date/(article title)}} from T:TDYK instead of the nomination itself. Let's see if anyone can think of any "catches" or downsides to this before we put up a formal proposal. 28bytes (talk) 18:57, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

I think something similar to AfD, GA reviews, etc. would work well. Nominator subst's a template on to the top of T:TDYK/Today, using only the article title (first article title in the case of a multi-hook) as a parameter. Template creates some kind of box with a link. Nominator clicks the link to go to a page-creation pre-loaded with the DYKnom template. Nominator fills in the relevant template parameters and saves, creating the sub-page. Bot puts a notification on the article talk page(s), as described above. Something like that, anyway... cmadler (talk) 19:20, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Whichever approach people prefer, I'll be happy to help with. 28bytes (talk) 01:34, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd be very happy for this proposal to proceed. Schwede66 03:32, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Before voting, I would ask tech-minded editors to comment on feasibility. We usually have 200+ noms, every nom has a few ticks (dyknom templates are commented out), meaning ~600 transcluded templates on one page. I think this will crash due to WP:Template limits. We can ban ship templates and tick templates though. Materialscientist (talk) 04:06, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Good point. The tick templates should be OK, though, since they're already subst'ed. 28bytes (talk) 04:25, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Whoops, I forgot that ticks are substituted. Then {{*mp}} is to be banned, preferably by software, or crashes will be hard to debug. I'm not sure what happens if we just transclude 300 nomination templates (with zero templates in them). Maybe this would be enough for a crash (?). Materialscientist (talk) 04:40, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Replacing {{*mp}} with a simple * would make sense, since it's already present in the cleared prep queues anyway. I can poke around and see how close to the transclusion limits the page is already. Template talk:Did you know/Full TOC transcludes the whole page already, so we can play around with a copy of that and drop some more transclusions in it to see what leeway we have. 28bytes (talk) 04:55, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Previous discussions of the issue (this list gets longer every time...)

• Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know/Archive_32#Individual_day_pages
• Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know/Archive_44#T:TDYK and Loading Times
• Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know/Archive_49#T:DYKT Page too big
• Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know/Archive_50#Archive_of_suggestion_page.3F
• Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know/Archive_53#Suggestion
• Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know/Archive_53#Subpages
• Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know/Archive_61#Discussion
• Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents/Plagiarism_and_copyright_concerns_on_the_main_page#Setting_up_date_subpages_and_archiving (my own proposal)

rʨanaɢ (talk) 04:29, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for posting those links. Looking over those conversations, the two main concerns I see as downsides for doing this are (1) Art LaPella's point that it wouldn't be easy to do a diff of T:TDYK to see what's changed, since the changes would be to the subpages, and (2) Orlady's similar concern that watchlisting T:TDYK alone would no longer be sufficient to see all the changes that are made to the nominations. I think everything else can be addressed by a well-designed bot, but those two points will require some more thought. 28bytes (talk) 04:50, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

• I think Rjanag's proposal to have transcluded pages by date (like Misplaced Pages:Files for deletion) would avert the template limit problem that would arise from having transcluded pages per nomination. This doesn't solve the problems that Art LaPella and Orlady described, but it would solve the template limit problem and still allow IPs to self-nominate (there's an IP self-nom for List of nutrition guides, History of USDA nutrition guides right now actually). OCNative (talk) 05:07, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

My thought is, if we're going to do this, we might as well go all the way and use the AfD method, so that individual nominations can be watchlisted. As someone who partipicates in both AfD and RfD discussions, I don't really like the fact that I have to "watch" the whole day's worth of RfD discussions when there's only one RfD discussion I care about. I think the transclusion limit issue can be managed, so I'd be hesitant to let that drive the design decision. 28bytes (talk) 05:14, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I agree that we should use the AfD method so that individual nominations can be watchlisted. My hope is this would allow more thorough and efficient discussion on each. While I appreciate Orlady's point that the page could not then be watchlisted as a whole, I think on the balance this approach would allow more people to be following their nominations and reviews rather than less, since people with only a few reviews/noms on the page (the majority) could more efficiently track them. Khazar (talk) 13:30, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Here is a quick test of 300 transclusions from User:Materialscientist/Sandbox2. Seems Ok, but maybe I'm missing something. Feel free to experiment. Materialscientist (talk) 05:23, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Preprocessor node count: 3003/1000000
Post-expand include size: 933300/2048000 bytes
Template argument size: 0/2048000 bytes
Expensive parser function count: 0/500

I'm a bit too sleepy for deeper analysis at the moment, but my first impression is that a bot isn't necessary and may not even help much. IPs can create talk pages, and any subpage of Template talk:Did you know counts. I'm also curious about the transclusion limits and will play around with MatSci's sandbox sometime this weekend. Also, shifting to transclusion might affect DYKcheck, but as long as T:TDYK looks the same, the script shouldn't need major changes. Shubinator (talk) 06:37, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

My thinking on the bot was that it could be helpful to minimize the disruption involved in a changeover to AfD-style watchable nominations. People would create nomination sections as they do now by subst'ing the NewDYKnom template, and the bot would handle converting that into a transcluded subpage. That would eliminate the need to have to re-write the nominating instructions before phasing in the change. 28bytes (talk) 07:08, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I think it might end up causing more disruption though. The bot isn't going to be bug-free, and when it crashes things will get fairly chaotic much faster. If we're planning on changing to manual transclusion at some point, might as well do it at the same time as switching to the transclusion system in general; that way we make all our changes in one go, so there's only one change to get used to. Shubinator (talk) 15:19, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough. I'll defer to your judgment on that. But bot or no bot, I do wish we could implement transclusions without making it a two-step process. I find AfD nominations to be a bit of pain unless I'm using Twinkle, I'd hate to make the DYK nomination process unnecessarily harder for people if it can be avoided. 28bytes (talk) 15:53, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

If we go with the page per nomination scheme, without a bot it has to be a two-step process. Shubinator (talk) 06:57, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

It would be nice to have these transclusions; it would make returning hooks from the queue a lot easier, especially if we archived on a day by day basis like at AFD. Crisco 1492 (talk) 07:18, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

However, loading Material Scientist's test page (with 300 nominations) took a while. Editing should be easier, but loading it still takes a good 2 minutes here. Crisco 1492 (talk) 07:46, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't think I'd be opposed to setting up AfD-style transclusions (by nomination, rather than by date), although I'll have to re-check the past discussions to refresh my memory about the various issues. 28bytes, I don't entirely agree with your summary of what the most major arguments were (although maybe that's just because of my personal preferences); Orlady's point seemed like a non-issue to me, given that watching T:TDYK doesn't seem extremely useful even now. The points that I remember driving several of the previous discussions were 1) it would be hard to proofread a bunch of noms in a single edit (I remember Art used to do that a lot, although now it seems like he's editing the queues rather than T:TDYK directly), and that it might make it difficult to grab multiple hooks for the prep (I don't remember the details of that argument off the top of my head, though, and it seems like something that can be worked around).

If we go forward with it, someone will need to design new templates (or at least instructions) for the process. I think {{NewDYKnom}} will still be usable on subpages, though. rʨanaɢ (talk) 14:18, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I fiddled around with MatSci's sandbox and came up with these numbers after adding more complexity:

Preprocessor node count: 3588/1000000
Post-expand include size: 1195554/2048000 bytes
Template argument size: 535/2048000 bytes
Expensive parser function count: 0/500

Looks good to me; we can also probably use {{*mp}} without worrying about the transclusion limits. Shubinator (talk) 06:54, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

To prep composers

If there is a shortage of pictured hooks, one way around is to go through ample articles and suggest a picture (authors often forget that), sometimes from a linked, but non-bolded article. Sometimes just by reading a hook it is clear that some article in it should have nice pictures. This is to avoid putting stubs as leads only because they happened to have a picture at T:TDYK. Materialscientist (talk) 02:44, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Technically, stubs shouldn't be passed anyway, right? (Although it seems to me that what constitutes a "stub" is less and less clear these days.) rʨanaɢ (talk) 04:34, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

It's my understanding that an article that passes they DYK prose size check is not a stub and should have its status changed to start or C. Or is this incorrect? BarkingMoon (talk) 10:39, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

I used "stub" as a figurative term for a short article (with a dull hook and or/picture, I should add). Articles eligible for DYK are defined as non-stubs. Materialscientist (talk) 10:56, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

My general rule of thumb for a stub is <3000 bytes w/o sections is a stub.--NortyNort (Holla) 12:59, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

A typical (non-DYK) definition is that stubs have less than 10 sentences. I haven't ever checked, but I'd guess that a DYK that barely clears the 1,500-character limit (and has reasonably typical prose) is a time and a half that size. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:38, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

On occasion, I've reviewed articles that reach the 1500 byte threshold, but do still do not seem to cover the subject enough not to be considered what constitutes a start class article. In these instances I have either informed the editor of my concern or tried to expand, rather than just changing from stub to start class. Really case by case, then hard 1500+ = start class IMO Calmer Waters 02:11, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

There's no mechanical stub definition; see the Croughton-London rule. Reviewers should evaluate whether a nominated article is a stub, and either (temporarily?) reject the nomination if it is, or ensure that the article is correctly marked as a non-stub. cmadler (talk) 15:19, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Sorry to be boring, but pictured hooks are in Special occasions for both 13 and 14 June. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:45, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

There are lots of pictured hooks right now. What there's a dearth of is good quirky ones. BarkingMoon (talk) 20:51, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Can't make Bach quirky every time. But 13 June is soon. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:26, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Brood XIX is quirky and it has a picture of a giant insect with gleaming red monster eyes. Helpfully, Sharktopus. Sharktopus 02:08, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Intending this in as light-hearted a way as is possible. One thing that might help on both the pictured and quirky front would be if prep loaders tried to avoid unilaterally pissing off literally a dozen editors who have worked together in an attempt to do both. Especially when it comes to articles with dozens of plausible hooks and matching images. —WFC— 01:54, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

There simply aren't enough slots to use every hook nom'd with a photo.BarkingMoon (talk) 01:57, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

A robotic response that has both missed and demonstrated my point. Sometimes there will be a dearth of pictured hooks, sometimes a dearth of quirky ones, and sometimes surpluses of either or both. If we are trying to cut down on the droughts, we should think long and hard about how we treat those that might or will be rejected during bumper harvests. —WFC— 02:05, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

A robotic response that missed my point.BarkingMoon (talk) 02:38, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

"Danger! Danger, Will Robinson!" (now that's a robotic response that misses the point) - Dravecky (talk) 03:09, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Link synchronization

I noticed that Misplaced Pages:Main Page/Tomorrow still contained the wording "From Misplaced Pages's newest articles" (which we've replaced on the main page with "From Misplaced Pages's newest content"), so I updated all of the preparation areas and queues. I then observed the word "articles" returning as they were reset, which I attributed to the fact that I'd neglected to update Template:Did you know/Clear. So I did that and restored the update where it was lost. But I see that this also failed to resolve the issue, as the old wording has again returned.
If I've overlooked a template, can someone familiar with the process please point it out and/or update it?
If I haven't overlooked a template, I assume that the text is being copied from various editors' personal documents (in which case I'll set out to notify them). Thanks! —David Levy 12:54, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

We clear preps by reverting to an old edit (the easiest way), which is why your changes were erased. I (and hopefully other promoting admins) shall keep your note in mind when clearing preps, that should fix the problem. Materialscientist (talk) 13:12, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Ah , I should have realized that. Thanks for your help! —David Levy 13:31, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Q5 cap badge image license issue

Is this image really PD and if so with the proper type license? It's a cap badge of the Royal Army Medical Corps. The person who uploaded it did so with a "I the copyright holder release it to PD..." license. I highly doubt a private person held the right to a British military emblem. I know US gov images are PD and such a US equivalent of this would be released with "US Army PD" tag, but I don't know about British military images. Even if this is PD, it's using the wrong type of PD license tag; in such a case it should use a "British Army PD" tag. Please advise. BarkingMoon (talk) 13:14, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I checked it is PD, but didn't update the template (updated). Materialscientist (talk) 13:20, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

No problem. I see you fixed the temp and Commons versions. BarkingMoon (talk) 13:25, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Carra Castle DYK, now in Queue 6

At Template:Did you know/Queue/6, there should be no apostrophe in "the McDonnells" in the hook now reading "... that Carra Castle was once occupied by Shane O'Neill who held Sorley Boy McDonnell as a prisoner there in 1565, and the McDonnell's later got their revenge by beheading O'Neill there?" Moonraker (talk) 22:53, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Done. Dabomb87 (talk) 00:06, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Adding an article after a DYK was approved?

The periodical cicadas of Brood XIX have been buzzing up a storm in the southeastern US the past month, and my DYK just got approved with the hook ".. that a new species of periodical cicada (pictured) was discovered by studying the songs of Brood XIX, now re-emerging in 2011 after 13 years underground?" But in the meantime, I created an article about said new species (Magicicada neotredecim), so would it be ok to bold the words "new species" in the existing hook and link to that article from it, to have that be a hook for both articles? Sharktopus 02:00, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Bolden, add credits for the second article, and leave a note in the review section that a new article is added and needs to be checked. Materialscientist (talk) 02:06, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Dohhh, I forgot about the part that this would get held up again for the new article to be checked. OK. Thanks for such a quick answer. Sharktopus 02:15, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Checked, and it's good to go. Cheers, Khazar (talk) 02:45, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Appearing on ITN

When I last worked at DYK, an article having appeared as the bolded link at ITN would preclude it being posted later to DYK as a bolded link. This remains in the WP:DYK#Rules currently, the argument being that DYK's supposed to show these articles off but if they've appeared on ITN already then it's had its chance. 61st FIFA Congress, which appeared on ITN about 10 days ago when the "election" took place, was for some reason approved despite this rule still being in place, and is currently on the main page as a bolded article for the second time. So maybe it's time for DYK to revisit this rule, or to make sure reviewers check more closely for previous ITN appearances. Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 02:30, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Pulled off. Thanks. Materialscientist (talk) 02:49, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Looks like this appeared on ITN several days after its review, so the fault appears to be the reviewers not tracking the article post-review, rather than missing it on the first pass. Khazar (talk) 03:04, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

13 and 14 June

As mentioned above, Special occasions has hooks which were not yet taken, sorry to be boring, one mentions Monday, one Tuesday, smile, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:35, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

One in Queue 4, one in prep1. Materialscientist (talk) 07:52, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 19:32, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

feast or famine?

How are we going WRT hook depth? I can never tell by looking at the pages whether we have alot, or not enough. Is it worth going to 6 hourly again for a few days? Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:03, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

We've been on a 6-hour cycle for the past 4 to 5 days now. See #Backlog above. —Bruce1ee 08:34, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

D'oh! Shoulda checked...Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:54, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Courtesy note: DYK mentioned at ANI

This is a courtesy note to inform DYK regulars that DYK has been mentioned in a couple of threads at ANI related to one user's behaviour here some time last year (when I was still active at DYK). The incident is regarding User:TonyTheTiger, who was involved in spamming DYK last year during the WikiCup (see also WT:DYK/WC and talk archive 58). This has been brought up at WP:ANI#Featured_Sounds_Process and WP:ANI#1:_Topic_ban_of_TonyTheTiger_from_Featured_Sounds. Please review and leave comments if necessary. Thanks, Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 10:15, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Oddly enough this is the second time we've met up today, Passerby. I've left a short comment there – thanks for the notification. Ed  10:35, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Query

Since I'm being pilloried above for my suggestions in hook reviews, I'm posting a question/suggestion here, hoping for your advice. Since hooks are by their nature a bit less formal than, say, the FA text that lies above them on the main page, I think it would be acceptable to use contractions, but judiciously. This current nom stood out as possibility:

... that in one of Uruguay's hill slopes near Fuerte San Miguel, there is an outpost which includes a wall and small window, but otherwise appears natural, like a cave or animal shelter?

"there's an outpost"? Tony (talk) 15:07, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Again, sorry you feel pilloried; never my intent. Anyway, your "judicious use" exception here seems sensible. Cheers, Khazar (talk) 15:12, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

No problem with the contraction, but perhaps the whole hook could be reworded? I don't read Spanish, so this may not match the meaning of the source, but maybe something like: ... one outpost of Uruguay's Fuerte San Miguel has a small window constructed to look like a cave or an animal burrow? Thanks, cmadler (talk) 15:52, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Queue update overdue

According to the time table at T:DYK/Q, the queue update is 32 minutes overdue. That time table says it should have happened at 14:00 NY time and it's already 14:35. Or is the table wrong? BarkingMoon (talk) 18:32, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

As the time stamp sig above is 18:32 and the table also says it's due at 19:00UTC, methinks the table is wrong.BarkingMoon (talk) 18:34, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

If I'm not mistaken, the table said the next update was at 19:00 London time. London isn't at UTC right now (daylight savings). Shubinator (talk) 07:15, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Manually updating. Thanks for noticing. Will look into what happened when finished, if not addressed Calmer Waters 18:44, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

It was missing a <!--Hooks-->. Admins should watchlist User:DYKUpdateBot/Errors. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 19:22, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Death of Selena

Was there a problem that I haven't seen? I thought it was ready to go and now its archived? AJona1992 (talk) 19:33, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

It's in Queue 3 waiting to go to the main page - Basement12 (T.C) 19:41, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, AJona1992 (talk) 19:52, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Tom Kahn in Queue 2

In Queue 2 , Tom Kahn helped Soldarity in 1980–1981 (but not in 1979–1981).  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 23:00, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Changed. Thanks. Materialscientist (talk) 23:45, 12 June 2011 (UTC)