Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Single/2008-06-09
Board elections continue
Ting Chen wins 2008 Board Election
26 June 2008
Board elections completed; results forthcoming
23 June 2008
Board elections continue
9 June 2008
Board elections open
2 June 2008
Board elections: Candidate questions
26 May 2008
Board elections: Voting information, new candidates
19 May 2008
Board candidacies open through May 22
12 May 2008
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Ting Chen wins 2008 Board Election |
This week, the elections continue.
The fifth election to the Wikimedia Board of Trustees opened on Sunday. Fifteen users are vying for one (1) one-year seat, to be filled in the election. As of press time, 2,310 valid votes had been cast.
With just over a week left in voting, little additional news has come up regarding the election.
Voting
To help users decide which candidate(s) to support, we compiled a list of candidate questions that we felt were important. These questions are still available, and have been updated to reflect responses made over the last week:
As in previous years, election officials will monitor votes for voting irregularities, and discount votes as necessary, if it is deemed that some votes are those of sockpuppets. All voters must have made at least 600 edits before March 1, 2008 on any one wiki, and have made at least 50 edits between January 1 and May 29, 2008 on that particular wiki. The wiki for these requirements must be the same one for both, and edits cannot be combined across multiple wikis to gain suffrage. Exceptions to these edit requirements are given to Wikimedia server administrators with shell access, paid staff of the Wikimedia Foundation who began working at the office before March 1, and current and former members of the Board of Trustees.
WikiWorld: "Triskaidekaphobia"
- This comic originally appeared on May 7, 2007.
This week's WikiWorld comic uses text from "Triskaidekaphobia" and "Friday the 13th". The comic is released under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.5 license for use on Wikipedia and elsewhere.
News and notes
Wikipedia: "Best general resource" for military research
It was recently noted that a 2007 book by Simon Fowler, Guide to Military History on the Internet, rated Wikipedia as the best general resource for military research, and the number one "military site". Fowler remarked that "The results are largely accurate and generally free of bias" and "Wikipedia is often criticised for its inaccuracy and bias, but in my experience the military history articles are spot on." He also suggested that readers join the Military history WikiProject.
The WikiProject also picked up ten photographs from war zones, taken by Getty Images photographer Jonathan Alpeyrie. Alpeyrie contacted the OTRS photo submission system to offer the pictures, and the set was uploaded over the last week.
Briefly
- Wikipedia was a nominee for the 2008 Prince of Asturias Awards, in the "Communications and Humanities" category. The award was won by Google.
- The Tumbuka Wikipedia has reached 100 articles.
- The Lithuanian Wiktionary has reached 50,000 articles.
- The Estonian Wikipedia has reached 50,000 articles.
- The Belarusian (Taraškievica) Wikipedia has reached 10,000 articles.
- The Interlingue Wikipedia has reached 1,000 articles.
- The Hindi Wikipedia has reached 20,000 articles.
In the news
Other mentions
Other recent mentions in the online media include:
- Encyclopaedia Britannica To Follow Modified Wikipedia Model – A new, interactive version of Encyclopaedia Britannica will have expert-contributed content, user-created content and the Encyclopaedia itself.
- Wikipedia's Co-Founder Wants to Make It More Useful to Academe – Jimmy Wales says that Wikipedia entries are "remarkably better" than what they were several years ago, and says that flagged revisions "could be cited more comfortably by an academic".
- Government buffing Prentice's Wikipedia entry – Edits to the Wikipedia article on Jim Prentice, Canada's Minister of Industry, from within Industry Canada were discovered by Michael Geist.
Dispatches: Main page day
If you are one of the primary editors of a featured article (FA), the day the article is featured on the main page can be one of the most exciting and nerve-wracking parts of being a Wikipedian. You and your collaborators have endeavored to prepare an outstanding article suitable for Wikipedia's diverse readership, and main page day will be a major test. Your work will be presented to the world as an example of our best work, and is likely to be scrutinized by many readers and editors who might otherwise not have seen it. From the moment the article hits the main page at midnight UTC, its readership will grow exponentially; many of these readers will have their own thoughts about the article and may edit it accordingly.
Most of your new readers will be unfamiliar with what you've been through to achieve FA status for the article: the research, the writing, the checking, the revising, peer review, more revising, and finally, featured article candidacy. They may make a comment or an edit that goes against a consensus that took weeks to achieve. They may question a sentence, a source, or even the notability of the entire article. However, with the right preparation you'll breeze through main page day.
This dispatch is intended to prepare you for that day and to help you deal with issues that may arise. If you take nothing else from this page, remember:
- The article will be edited by people you've never heard of.
- The article will not be protected from editing in anticipation of main page day, although its title and the opening that is displayed on the main page will be temporarily protected.
- The article will be vandalized by readers who think it is entertaining to do so.
- Stay calm!
Preparing for main page day
You may have requested that your article appear on the main page on a certain day by application through the request process, or it may have been chosen directly by the featured article director. Either way, you will know several days ahead of time when your article is scheduled to appear, by checking Wikipedia:Today's featured article and clicking "This month's queue" or when the maindate parameter is added to the article's talk page. Determine what time your article will appear by calculating your offset from UTC (see "Date and time" under your "my preferences" link at the top of any page). For example, if you live in London, your article will appear at midnight local time on its scheduled day (1:00 am during summer time); if you live in Los Angeles, it will appear at 4:00 pm local time the day before its scheduled day (5:00 pm during daylight saving time).
When the article appears on the main page, questions will tend to pop up on the article's talk page immediately. It's hard for you to keep a 24-hour vigil to respond to these questions and to address concerns, but try to be available as much as possible for this purpose. You can count on other editors to revert vandalism, since main-page features are watched intensively. If there are other major contributors to the article, coordinate with them for maximum coverage; all the better if they're in different time-zones. Remember, no one is better equipped to address potential issues than those who worked on the article. WikiProject collaborators can also be of great help on main page day—make sure they are aware of the event and direct them to this Dispatch.
Monitoring edits: be an ambassador for Wikipedia
Expect several talk-page posts requesting clarification, explanation and expansion. Treat each question as a good-faith request and do your best to answer it. If the question illustrates an opportunity to improve the article, take that opportunity. If you don't know the answer, reach out to subject matter experts at related WikiProjects who will be watching the article. If a question is an obvious attempt at trolling, it's best to ignore it. Remember that main page features are the most public face of Wikipedia: you and your collaborators will be ambassadors to the world on that day, and prompt responses are likely to generate goodwill towards the project and to increase its authority on the Internet.
Responding to criticism
Readers are likely to post criticism of your article. Most will leave a message on the article talk page; some will just edit the article and—if you're lucky—leave their criticism in an edit summary. Criticism may involve content and perceived notability. Some topics attract editors with specific agendas. If your article is about any controversial topic, you can count on editors representing every point of view to show up on main page day.
Notability is a requirement for any Wikipedia article; any Wikipedia article can become a featured article when it meets the featured article criteria and successfully passes through the candidacy process. Many featured articles are not on traditional encyclopedia topics such as animals, plants, historical figures, and geographical locations. Wikipedia offers a much wider scope, including topics that may raise notability issues; this is especially the case in biographies of living people, and in popular culture, commerce, and the media. If a main page article is on such a topic, be prepared to field comments about its notability. Some of these comments are made in good faith—the reader may not understand Wikipedia's guidelines and processes. You should respond to good-faith comments and questions about your article's notability with a brief explanation of and a link to our notability guideline. Popular culture articles may be disparaged and commercial topics may be labeled as "spam" or "adverts". Do not engage with editors making this type of comment.
Recreational criticism includes "drive-by" comments that are not actionable and do not correspond to the featured article criteria or general article policies and guidelines, such as notability, neutral point of view or no advertising. Good-faith but recreational comments such as "This is a pretty obscure topic" may be responded to with a simple "Thank you for your feedback"; uncivil, unreasonable, or just irrational comments such as "This sucks!" and "You call this a featured article LOL!" should be ignored unless the editor makes disruptive edits to the article or resorts to personal attacks. Disruptive edits and personal attacks should be reported to an administrator or to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents. Engaging with uncivil, recreational critics is rarely a good use of your time and may not make Wikipedia look good.
Constructive criticism offers reasonable suggestions about improving the article. Respond to constructive criticism with grace and patience; if the editor requests major or controversial changes, suggest building consensus on the article talk-page first. Take the opportunity of drawing visitors who are potentially valuable Wikipedians into the project through their main page experience.
Features and admins
Administrators
Five users were granted admin status via the Requests for Adminship process this week: Xenocidic (nom), Ddstretch (nom), Pegship (nom), AngelOfSadness (nom), and Tanthalas39 (nom).
Bureaucrats
One user was promoted to bureaucrat status via the Requests for Bureaucratship process this week: EVula (nom).
Bots
Twelve bots or bot tasks were approved to begin operating this week: DOI bot (task request), Addbot (task request), Zorrobot (task request), Albambot (task request), ClueBot VI (task request), Denbot (task request), Lightbot (task request), Diligent Terrier Bot (task request), ENewsBot (task request), MBisanzBot (task request), DvyBot (task request), TinucherianBot (task request), and WolterBot (task request).
Featured pages
Twelve articles were promoted to featured status last week: Riven (nom), Zelda Fitzgerald (nom), Baby Boy (song) (nom), Madman Muntz (nom), White-winged Fairy-wren (nom), Common Treecreeper (nom), Việt Nam Quốc Dân Đảng (nom), Nimrod Expedition (nom), Calgary Hitmen (nom), Thoroughbred (nom), Benjamin Franklin Tilley (nom), and PowerBook 100 (nom).
Four lists were promoted to featured status last week: The Strokes discography (nom), List of Sites of Special Scientific Interest in the West Midlands (nom), List of highways in Warren County, New York (nom), and List of New York Jets head coaches (nom).
No topics were promoted to featured status last week.
No portals were promoted to featured status last week.
The following featured articles were displayed last week on the Main Page as Today's featured article: Harold Innis, Confederate government of Kentucky, Funerary Monument to Sir John Hawkwood, Émile Lemoine, Sertraline, Formation and evolution of the Solar System, and Wilco.
Former featured pages
One article was delisted last week: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV series) (nom)
No lists were delisted last week.
One topic was delisted last week: Devil May Cry (nom)
Featured media
The following featured pictures were displayed last week on the Main Page as picture of the day: Pterois, Medium Tank M3, Eastern Bearded Dragon, Portsmouth Square, Boar, Leopard Lacewing and Dunlin.
No sounds were featured last week.
One featured picture was demoted last week: Reichstag flag.
Eight pictures were promoted to featured status last week and are shown below.
Bugs, Repairs, and Internal Operational News
This is a summary of recent technology and site configuration changes that affect the English Wikipedia. Note that not all changes described here are necessarily live as of press time; the English Wikipedia is currently running version 1.44.0-wmf.5 (d64f667), and changes to the software with a version number higher than that will not yet be active. Configuration changes and changes to interface messages, however, become active immediately.
Fixed bugs
- Several bugs were fixed in the move-with-subpages option this week:
- Moving a page, with subpages, to a subpage of itself now works correctly. (r35762, bug 14368)
- Moving pages with subpages now errors out correctly when the resulting pages would end up with names which are too long. (r35824, bug 14385)
- Moving a page in a talk namespace with its subpages now moves the resulting pages into the correct namespace (previously the pages would be mistakenly moved into the namespace with the next higher internal number, e.g. before this fix, moving User talk pages with subpages within the User talk namespace would move the resulting pages into the Wikipedia namespace). (r35870, bug 14386)
- More fixes to Single User Login were made this week:
- Single User Login was broken for a few hours on 3 May 2008 due to a software mistake, but was fixed soon after. (r35781, bug 14390)
- When a global account is created, and used to automatically create a new local account (e.g. by logging into one wiki, then visiting another never-previously-visited-wiki), and then unmerged (i.e. the global account is deleted), the new local accounts no longer sometimes end up unusable. (However, some existing local user accounts affected by this problem have not been corrected, the fix for the bug simply prevents it happening in the future; resetting the password for such accounts via email has been reported to help in some circumstances.) (r35923, bug 14330)
- The option to watch a user's userpage and talkpage when blocking them now only has an effect if the block succeeds. (r35763, bug 14367)
- If the database is read-only (for instance, because server lag is too high or developers are investigating a problem), this is now mentioned on the form for creating a new user (which is impossible when the database is read-only). (r35885, bug 11771)
- Categories whose names come after Category:Unprintworthy redirects in alphabetical order now show correct counts. (bug 14361, fixed by modifying the database rather than in code)
- The accountcreator group was broken for a while, about 6 June 2008, causing it to do nothing rather than allow more than 6 accounts to be created in a day, due to a software logic mistake; this has now been fixed. (r35970, bug 14424)
New feature
- An (ignorable) warning is now displayed when uploading an image that's identical to another currently existing image. (r35609, bug 13434)
Configuration changes
- The move pages with subpages option is now only available to administrators; this change was made due to overwhelming support for it in a discussion on the proposals village pump. (bug 14482)
Ongoing news
- Internationalisation has been continuing as normal; help is always appreciated! See mw:Localisation statistics for how complete the translations of languages you know are, and post any updates to bugzilla or use Betawiki.
The Report on Lengthy Litigation
The Arbitration Committee did not open or close any cases this week, leaving four cases currently open.
Evidence phase
- C68-FM-SV: A case involving disputes between Cla68, FeloniousMonk, SlimVirgin, JzG, and others.
- Giovanni33: A case involving the accusation of sockpuppetry by Giovanni33. Giovanni33 and Rafaelsfingers, who has been labeled as a sockpuppet of Giovanni33 by some, have denied the charges.
Voting phase
- Homeopathy: A dispute involving a number of editors over the Homeopathy article. Remedies with the support of five to seven arbitrators include banning DanaUllman for one year, the creation of a "Sourcing Adjudication Board" regarding the inappropriate use of citations, and emphasizing the Committee's ability to issue subsequent sanctions in the case, based on reports of "inappropriate conduct" as judged by the Sourcing Adjudication Board. Another remedy, with the support of five arbitrators, allows uninvolved administrators to impose sanctions on editors involved in Homeopathy-related articles, for various reasons.
Motion to close
- Footnoted quotes: A case involving the use of quotes in footnotes, and general concerns with the biographies of living persons policy. Currently, one arbitrator supports closing the case, with two opposing. Remedies supported by eight arbitrators encourage more enforcement of the BLP policy, and impose a one-year restriction banning Alansohn from making any edits judged to be "uncivil, personal attacks, or assumptions of bad faith". The latter remedy allows his blocking, without warning, should he violate it. The former remedy currently passes, but the two opposing arbitrators have cited concerns about the remedy as written.