Wikipedia:WikiProject Unreferenced articles/Backlog drives/November 2024

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WP:NOV24

The following event is now closed. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Unreferenced articles.

Welcome to the WikiProject Unreferenced Articles November 2024 backlog drive! At the start of the drive, there were 80,645 articles tagged as entirely without references on Wikipedia. At the end of the drive, there were 72,134, a net decrease of 8,511 articles. In addition, Category:All unreferenced BLPs was completely cleared temporarily!

Reducing the number unsourced articles improves the quality of Wikipedia as a whole, verifying accurate information in articles and helping to remove the inaccurate.

To participate: (§ Detailed instructions)

Find an article that is currently tagged as unreferenced.
Add at least one inline citation of a reliable source to the article, then accurately update its tags.
Include #NOV24 in the edit summary (once per article) to have your contributions counted in this drive. There must not be any immediately preceding characters before the hashtag.^[a]

Reviewers will check submissions. 1 point will be awarded for adding references, and 0.5 points for each review. Mass deletion or tag removals are strictly prohibited.

Sign up here

Fix a random page lacking sources Fix a random BLP lacking sources

The referencing portion of the drive ran from November 1, 00:00 UTC until December 1, 23:59 UTC. Only submissions made in this period will be counted. The review period of the drive extended until December 7, 23:59 UTC to allow time for additional reviews.

Where to get help

For advice on adding references, read the § Tips on this page and the helpful guide at Wikipedia:Citing sources, or ask at the WikiProject Unreferenced Articles talk page.

If you have questions or concerns about the drive, please use the backlog drive talk page or contact the organizers, Kazamzam, Cielquiparle and ARandomName123. For technical issues, contact DreamRimmer, who is providing technical support for this drive.

Rules

1 point for adding at least one inline citation from a reliable source to an unreferenced article, usually tagged with {{Unreferenced}} or {{BLP unsourced}}. Untagged, but unreferenced articles are also acceptable.
- No points for simply listing references in a section.
- To keep this drive focused, no points for adding additional citations to one article, though editors are encouraged to do so whenever possible.
- Primary sources are permitted so long as they are only used to make straightforward, descriptive statements of facts. Please see WP:PRIMARY.
- If the article is not fully supported by the new reference, add {{citation needed}} as needed.
0.5 points for reviewing submissions of the drive. See more at /Reviews.
- The point is less because reviewing submissions is easier than finding reliable sources. Nevertheless, reviewers have an extremely important job of verifying submissions and require a high level of trust.
No points for deleting an article via AfD, PROD or blank and redirect. (See this discussion)
All citing contributions without #NOV24 in the edit summary will not be counted. There must not be any immediately preceding characters before the hashtag.^[a]
- If making multiple edits to an article, include #NOV24 in only one edit summary.
- If the editor forgets to put that summary, they may add it retroactively using a dummy edit.
Problematic behaviors are grounds towards disqualification and blocks. Examples are:
- Spamming articles to AfD/PROD/blank and redirect
- Mass-removal of {{Unreferenced}}
- Adding fake references and content
- Being disruptive by being uncivil, wikilawyering, etc.

Detailed instructions

Find an article in Category:Articles lacking sources (credits to User:Ajpolino and User:Ipigott). Here are some ways to search:

By search term: go to the search bar and type [search term] incategory:"All articles lacking sources".
By WikiProject: go to Bambot's WikiProject Cleanup Listings, find the project name and click "by cat", then scroll to find the category "Cites no sources".
By article topic: use the navbox on Category:Articles lacking sources, or search articletopic:[topic] incategory:"All articles lacking sources".
By category: use WP:PetScan to find the intersection between "All articles lacking sources" and a chosen category by entering both in "Categories" on separate lines, without the "Category:" part.
By popularity: see § Popular articles

Then, find a reliable source.

Familiarize yourself with reliable sources on Wikipedia.
For tips, see § Some tricks and § Determining what sources are usable.

If at least one reliable source is found, follow these steps:

Cite it inline. Be sure to include all the needed citation data including the title, date, and author/publisher (see WP:CITE). Page numbers and ISBN are strongly recommended wherever present. Place the citation after the punctuation, with no space.
Add {{reflist}} and ==References== if not yet present (see MOS:ORDER).
Remove {{Unreferenced}} or {{BLP unsourced}}. It is recommended to replace it with {{More citations needed}} if large parts of the article are still unreferenced, or add {{cn}} to short chunks of text.
Add an edit summary including #NOV24. Do this only once per article, even if you make multiple edits.

If no reliable source can found with the best of your effort, according to WP:BEFORE, there are a few options:

PROD the article if it is obvious that the article should be deleted.
AFD the article if it is not obvious that the article should be deleted.
Merge discussion and redirect the article if the article has some useful content but it is not notable.
Make a new thread at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Unreferenced articles if you are unsure.

Progress

Update this page

Goal: Bring the backlog down by 10,000 and clear Category:All unreferenced BLPs.

Progress chart
Date	Participants	Articles	Change since previous day	Change since beginning
1 November 2024	120	80,645	—	—
2 November 2024	128	80,095	550	550
3 November 2024	134	79,607	488	1038
4 November 2024	141	79,204	403	1441
5 November 2024	144	78,815	389	1830
6 November 2024	147	78,566	249	2079
7 November 2024	148	78,220	346	2425
8 November 2024	150	77,906	314	2739
9 November 2024	150	77,622	284	3023
10 November 2024	150	77,403	219	3242
11 November 2024	152	77,224	179	3421
12 November 2024	154	76,998	226	3647
13 November 2024	154	76,752	246	3893
14 November 2024	156	76,695	57	3950
15 November 2024	158	76,280	415	4365
16 November 2024	158	76,094	186	4551
17 November 2024	158	76,103	9	4542
18 November 2024	158	76,185	82	4460
19 November 2024	158	75,954	231	4691
20 November 2024	160	75,733	221	4912
21 November 2024	160	75,397	336	5248
22 November 2024	160	75,128	269	5517
23 November 2024	160	74,793	335	5852
24 November 2024	159	74,602	191	6043
25 November 2024	159	74,206	396	6439
26 November 2024	162	73,919	287	6726
27 November 2024	164	73,732	187	6913
28 November 2024	165	73,555	177	7090
29 November 2024	165	73,242	313	7403
30 November 2024	165	72,834	408	7811
1 December 2024	166	72,485	349	8160
2 December 2024	166	72,134	351	8511

Milestones

2 November 2024: total number of unreferenced articles below 80,000 for the first time since record-keeping began in August 2009
5 November 2024: December 2008, the oldest category at start of drive, is completed
12 November 2024: total number of unreferenced articles below 77,000
19 November 2024: total number of unreferenced articles below 76,000 (added citations to 5,000 articles)
22 November 2024: our resident megafauna, the category December 2009, shrinks below 10,000 articles for the first time
23 November 2024: total number of unreferenced articles below 75,000
26 November 2024: total number of unreferenced articles below 74,000
27 November 2024: backlog for January 2009 cleared
29 November 2024: total number of unreferenced articles below 73,000

Oldest backlogs

Cleared backlogs

Category:Articles lacking sources from December 2008 (Category does not exist or has been deleted due to completion of task.)
Started at November 1, 2024 with 190 articles. 0 left.

190 / 190 (100%)

Category:Articles lacking sources from January 2009 (Category does not exist or has been deleted due to completion of task.)
Started at November 1, 2024 with 320 articles. 0 left.

320 / 320 (100%)

Category:Articles lacking sources from February 2009 (Category does not exist or has been deleted due to completion of task.)
Started at November 1, 2024 with 195 articles. 0 left.

195 / 195 (100%)

Category:Articles lacking sources from March 2009 (Category does not exist or has been deleted due to completion of task.)
Started at November 1, 2024 with 350 articles. 0 left.

350 / 350 (100%)

Category:Articles lacking sources from April 2009
Started at November 5, 2024 with 232 articles. 69 left.

163 / 232 (70%)

Category:Articles lacking sources from May 2009
Started at November 10, 2024 with 374 articles. 247 left.

127 / 374 (34%)

Leaderboard

Last updated December 09, 2024, 01:21 UTC

Rank	User	Tally	References	Reviews	Total
1	JTtheOG	Tally	806	194.0	1000.0
2	MPGuy2824	Tally	531	11.0	542.0
3	Turtlecrown	Tally	484	9.5	493.5
4	Isaidnoway	Tally	377	0.0	377.0
5	Cielquiparle	Tally	353	4.0	357.0
6	Smallangryplanet	Tally	257	98.5	355.5
7	Apollo468	Tally	310	0.0	310.0
7	Fluorescent Jellyfish	Tally	214	96.0	310.0
9	Headhitter	Tally	267	0.0	267.0
10	Kazamzam	Tally	257	0.0	257.0
11	Suonii180	Tally	221	33.5	254.5
12	Nayyn	Tally	230	0.0	230.0
13	ResonantDistortion	Tally	200	10.5	210.5
14	Wozal	Tally	147	61.5	208.5
15	Anonymous1261	Tally	128	73.0	201.0
16	D-Flo27	Tally	148	52.0	200.0
17	Sam Sailor	Tally	186	6.0	192.0
18	SunloungerFrog	Tally	160	0.0	160.0
19	Coeusin	Tally	125	10.0	135.0
20	Ruud Buitelaar	Tally	132	1.5	133.5
21	Spiderpig662	Tally	100	13.0	113.0
22	The joy of all things	Tally	105	0.0	105.0
23	Mason7512	Tally	97	0.0	97.0
24	Liandrei	Tally	91	0.0	91.0
25	WeirdNAnnoyed	Tally	54	47.0	101.0
26	Feralcateater000	Tally	85	0.0	85.0
27	Gnisacc	Tally	84	0.0	84.0
28	Rosiestep	Tally	78	0.0	78.0
29	Demt1298	Tally	76	0.0	76.0
30	AlphaBetaGamma	Tally	75	0.0	75.0
31	Sleepytimecat	Tally	66	0.0	66.0
32	Riley1012	Tally	63	0.0	63.0
33	Significa liberdade	Tally	61	0.0	61.0
34	Lazman321	Tally	57	0.0	57.0
34	Toweli	Tally	57	0.0	57.0
36	Mrfoogles	Tally	46	10.0	56.0
37	MrLinkinPark333	Tally	53	2.5	55.5
38	GranCavallo	Tally	45	7.0	52.0
38	MSLQr	Tally	52	0.0	52.0
40	Jaguarnik	Tally	42	8.0	50.0
40	TheZoodles	Tally	25	25.0	50.0
42	Engrigg22	Tally	46	0.0	46.0
43	Bearian	Tally	45	0.0	45.0
43	Dumelow	Tally	45	0.0	45.0
45	Clarityfiend	Tally	42	2.5	44.5
46	TheBirdsShedTears	Tally	39	0.0	39.0
47	SonOfYoutubers	Tally	38	0.0	38.0
47	ARandomName123	Tally	38	0.0	38.0
49	SounderBruce	Tally	34	3.0	37.0
50	Wikibear47	Tally	36	0.0	36.0
51	SpookiePuppy	Tally	26	9.0	35.0
51	Lollipoplollipoplollipop	Tally	24	11.0	35.0
53	BaduFerreira	Tally	34	0.0	34.0
54	Engineerchange	Tally	28	0.0	28.0
54	TamsaVakaras	Tally	28	0.0	28.0
56	1AmNobody24	Tally	27	0.0	27.0
56	Reconrabbit	Tally	27	0.0	27.0
58	Another Believer	Tally	26	0.0	26.0
59	Reidgreg	Tally	25	0.0	25.0
59	Pichpich	Tally	25	0.0	25.0
59	Based5290	Tally	25	0.0	25.0
62	Donner60	Tally	24	0.0	24.0
63	Silver seren	Tally	23	0.0	23.0
63	Marcus Markup	Tally	23	0.0	23.0
65	GrabUp	Tally	21	0.0	21.0
65	Gazamp	Tally	22	0.0	22.0
67	TrademarkedTWOrantula	Tally	20	0.0	20.0
68	Ewhite31	Tally	19	0.0	19.0
69	Jengod	Tally	15	0.0	15.0
69	Semmendinger	Tally	15	0.0	15.0
71	Moriwen	Tally	14	0.0	14.0
71	GeorgeSonOfJohn	Tally	14	0.0	14.0
73	TheNuggeteer	Tally	11	2.5	13.5
74	Dan Leonard	Tally	9	3.0	12.0
75	R0paire-wiki	Tally	11	0.0	11.0
75	Conyo14	Tally	11	0.0	11.0
75	Voorts	Tally	11	0.0	11.0
75	Ayji	Tally	11	0.0	11.0
75	Darcyisverycute	Tally	11	0.0	11.0
75	Bo-3903	Tally	10	0.0	10.0
81	Joe Roe	Tally	10	0.0	10.0
81	Goldsztajn	Tally	10	0.0	10.0
81	Hog Farm	Tally	10	0.0	10.0
84	Ponyo	Tally	8	0.0	8.0
84	Dr vulpes	Tally	8	0.0	8.0
84	Cyanochic	Tally	8	0.0	8.0
87	Nnev66	Tally	7	0.0	7.0
87	CanonNi	Tally	7	0.0	7.0
89	Kline	Tally	6	0.0	6.0
89	Tea and Seed Cake	Tally	6	0.0	6.0
91	Hako9	Tally	0	5.5	5.5
92	Voidxor	Tally	5	0.0	5.0
92	Nil Nandy	Tally	5	0.0	5.0
92	ClaudineChionh	Tally	5	0.0	5.0
92	Jähmefyysikko	Tally	5	0.0	5.0
92	BeanieFan11	Tally	5	0.0	5.0
92	ThermodynamicLawyer	Tally	5	0.0	5.0
98	Sennecaster	Tally	2	2.5	4.5
99	Miminity	Tally	4	0.0	4.0
99	Contrawwftw	Tally	4	0.0	4.0
99	Mir Novov	Tally	4	0.0	4.0
99	Bpuddin	Tally	4	0.0	4.0
99	Hhmontanac	Tally	4	0.0	4.0
104	Garsh2	Tally	3	0.0	3.0
104	DreamRimmer	Tally	2	1.0	3.0
104	Tails Wx	Tally	3	0.0	3.0
104	Cremastra	Tally	3	0.0	3.0
104	HKRailEnthusiast	Tally	3	0.0	3.0
104	Veer27Gupta	Tally	3	0.0	3.0
110	DandelionAndBurdock	Tally	2	0.0	2.0
110	Rsrikanth05	Tally	2	0.0	2.0
110	Flounder fillet	Tally	2	0.0	2.0
110	Tvfunhouse	Tally	2	0.0	2.0
110	Knitsey	Tally	2	0.0	2.0
110	VastV0idInSpace0	Tally	0	2.0	2.0
110	Jlwoodwa	Tally	2	0.0	2.0
110	Pothos144	Tally	2	0.0	2.0
110	AddWittyNameHere	Tally	2	0.0	2.0
119	SL93	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Kmccook	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Clovermoss	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	GraziePrego	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Tavantius	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Myceteae	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	TyphoonAmpil	Tally	0	1.0	1.0
119	That Tired Tarantula	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Calmkelp	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Rusty Cat	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Tooncool64	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Syskerr91	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
119	Richard Nevell	Tally	1	0.0	1.0
-	EmilySarah99	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	MinTrouble	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Ajay Platinum	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Theki	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	CFA	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	NightWolf1223	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Memer15151	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	DoubleGrazing	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Meanderingbartender	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Jon Kolbert	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Peter Flass	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	AlexandraAVX	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Yue	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Alexeyevitch	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	-αβοοδ	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Pickersgill-Cunliffe	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Ratekreel	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	ThadeusOfNazereth	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	EF5	Tally	8	0.0	8.0
-	Yoblyblob	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Kingsmasher678	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Proplayer919	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Missalex420	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Esprit15d	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Heureuxl	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Endrabcwizart	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	MimirIsSmart	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Transgenderoriole	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Jannatulbaqi	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	AirshipJungleman29	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	LemonJuiceIsSour	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Patar knight	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Noxoug1	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Otr500	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
-	Postmud	Tally	0	0.0	0.0
Total			8079	803.5	8882.5

Participants

Sign up here

Reviews

All participants with experience in citing sources are encouraged to perform reviews. Reviewers will be awarded 0.5 points for each review. A tool is available to locate unreviewed submissions and simplify wikitext formatting.

Go to the /Reviews subpage

Tips

Determining what sources are usable

Even if we are just citing one source for an article, that source must be chosen carefully. That source needs to:

This is a lot to take in. And worse, sometimes you won't be able to find a source that meets these criteria! It can be very hard to determine whether you should go forward to cite the article or ask for its deletion, even for experienced WikiGnomers, and sometimes you have to follow through with your gut feelings.

Some suitable sources may be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Unreferenced articles/Resources or Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Perennial sources.

Examples of common not suitable sources include:

Tabloids – Daily Mail, listicles at Hindustan Times, etc.
Blogs – Wordpress, Blogger, personal websites
Wikipedia mirrors, substantially duplicating existing content
Books not under editorial control, print-on-demand, or self-published from groups such as Lulu.com, AuthorHouse, iUniverse, Trafford Publishing, Xlibris, PediaPress, etc. (tip: search Wikipedia for the publisher's name)
Websites made up of user-generated content such as IMDb, Goodreads and Fandom

Some tricks

Searching for sources (detailed guide at Wikipedia:Advanced source searching)

The {{Unreferenced}} template placed at the top of unreferenced pages contains many search links pre-filled with the article topic (and configured to exclude other Wikipedia articles).
On Google and some other search engines:
- Use "" (double quotes) to search for the term exactly. This means that "pinnochio" should only show pages containing "pinnochio", not pinocchio (but note that sometimes quotes are disregarded and the wrong term is shown anyway).
- Use - (dash) to exclude pages containing unwanted terms, e.g. -wikipedia.
Some articles, especially for more general topics, might have sources available with slightly different wording, e.g. "basketweaving" vs "basket weaving", "basket weaver", etc.
Search millions of old and new books at Google Books and Archive.org. For Archive.org, go to https://archive.org/search, click the search bar, then click the "search text contents" radio button to search inside over 10 million books.
Access to some pay-walled content, including academic journals, Newspapers.com and ProQuest, is provided to editors via The Wikipedia Library.
Check for sources in related articles on Wikipedia but do not simply copy the reference. Only after you've checked that the source is reliable and does indeed verify the text, you may use the citation.

Reading and parsing sources

Use the text searching feature to locate what you are looking for faster, such as Ctrl+F on Windows or ⌘ Cmd+F on macOS.
Translation for reading:
- You can use machine translation, either at a website or as built in to your web browser. However, these translations may be rough and should not be used indiscriminately in Wikipedia.
- To translate text that cannot be copied, for example on Google Books, you can take a screenshot of a passage and upload the image to Google Translate.

Processing articles

While you're there, you could expand the article with new information from your reliable sources, or clean up or tag other problems you find.
Twinkle might be helpful for cleaning up article banners and nominating articles for deletion
If you are familiar with AWB/JWB, you can use it to quickly add a "References" section and {{reflist}} template.

Unreferenced biographies

25 November 2024 - these are pretty much the last 19 16 12 11 8 4 3 ~~2(!)~~ ~~1(!!)~~ 0(!!) unreferenced BLPs left to deal with.

Well, we did it! All BLPs that aren't currently undergoing a deletion discussion process of some sort have now been dealt with. It's worth keeping an eye out for any new ones that pop up though. Here are two handy WP:PetScan links: