Wikipedia talk:In the news/Archive 101

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Proposal: Apply RD standard to blurbs

Recent deaths posts currently say Recent deaths of any person, animal or organism with a Wikipedia article are always presumed to be important enough to post (see this RFC and further discussion). Comments should focus on whether the quality of the article meets WP:ITNRD. This system has worked: RD posts are organized, civil, and productive. Compare that to the system for blurbs. There is constant arguing about what is "significant", and editors usually end up making up their own standards, sometimes with questionable arguments.

I propose that we append a similar quote to each blurb proposal on ITN, stating that any event with a Wikipedia article is presumed to be important enough to post. If an article is of sufficient quality for the main page, then post it to the main page. If it's not a notable event, then someone will nominate it for deletion. ITN had this same conversation in 2016, it was implemented for RD, and all of the worries proved unfounded. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 04:41, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Predicted this back in 2016 [1] /shrug. Banedon (talk) 07:20, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I've been thinking the same thing for a long while, and it's near the criteria I am already using in my own !voting. There's lots of complications in here (see movie releases, for just one example), while there's also lots of ways in which this streamlines things (such as with state funerals). It might require more stringent deletion of new articles on smaller accidents and massacres, but we'd still end up posting many more of those. We'd also be posting many more award ceremonies and the like. Article quality would become a major (if not the main) part of whether an article will be featured. I personally like this idea a lot, but it goes completely against the editorial ideas of most other editors here, who aim for the canonical worldwide newsticker first and foremost. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 10:01, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I would agree if we also increase the mandated size of the update related to recent events. As I note in the Phantom of the Opera nom, if a long quality article can sustain an substantial update to reflect recent events, that event may be of some significance. Absent this addendum, this proposal removes all standards of the significance of recent events, which is a bridge to far. The comparison to RDs is not apt as the death of a article subject is per se significant for that target. GreatCaesarsGhost 11:54, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Strongest possible oppose, at least right now with how broken WP is when it comes to NOTNEWS, NEVENTS, and article ownership. There would be, for example, topics dealing with nonsense, everyday US politics that get wide coverage and have decent articles, but that would never be the type we would never feature in ITN as currently, such as the mess around Clarence Thomas's reporting of gifts. The article is in good shape, it is widely covered, but at this point, it has no encyclopedic relevance because the end point that we should be interested in is if he resigns or is expelled from the seat.

ITN should not be the filter to determine NEVENTS applicability - editors should be doing that on their own before creating a new article or using NOTNEWS/RECENTISM before creating massive new sections in other articles (eg Twitter has been really hard to keep focused since Musk's takeover). And of course at the end of the day, ITN is not a news ticker, which this approach is basically arguing for. Masem (t) 12:07, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm highly doubtful that what you say will happen will in fact happen, because that assumes there are editors that participate in ITN who, the moment the walls come down, will be motivated to post every instant of trivial political or celebrity minutia that happens in the U.S.A. And for as long as I've been here, I haven't seen any evidence of this. Either way, we can avoid that by using GCG's and Maplestrip's sub-proposal which instead focuses more on having substantially updated articles. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 12:17, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Except the proposal is to do away with the significance criterion, and so anything that is nominated would be posted subject to article quality alone. All of the following would (probably) have been posted in the last 7 days but were not:

A peace deal happened 25 years ago
Another bit of self-driving car technology gets legal approval
Cyclone nominated before landfall that was less severe than it might have been
Diplomatic "crisis" that wasn't actually a crisis
Japanese prime minister is not injured
Minor incident in ongoing war
Musical closes
Opening of a nuclear power plant
Routine military posturing
Strike at a single university
US gun violence
US gun violence again

And the following were nominated and would have been posted if article quality had been better:

Apartment fire
Death of the former prime minister of Kuwait's son
Rocket launch that didn't happen

Which of these should be on ITN? If your answer is anything other than "all of them", how would you filter based on article quality alone? Thryduulf (talk) 12:38, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

A key part that, at least for myself, our goal at ITN should be is to try to cover a diverse set of topics. Geographically and topically (eg science, sports, politics, arts, etc.) ITNR helps to a degree but there's a lot of space for other topics that fill in voids. We know things like US and UK topics will generally be more plentiful being en.wiki, and we often focus on disaster articles (natural and manmade) since these are generally build up well and have typically represented the best of article creation and ITN working together. This proposal asks us to ignore this attempt at diversity and post anything that is in the news and meets quality goals. I can tell you easily that will further push coverage to US and UK topics nearly exclusively (see how long it takes disasters in third-world countries to get to sufficient length due to poor reporting); this reflects the typical news sources but as we're not a news source, we shouldn't worry about that. Masem (t) 12:43, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

This proposal asks us to ignore this attempt at diversity - I don't quite see how what we're posting now is diverse, based on recurring efforts to refuse those items that don't fit within a preconceived mold of significance. If you go back to ITN in 2010 or 2015, you will see far more diversity in the stories that were posted compared to now. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 13:18, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm constantly confused by the idea that promoting diversity doesn't mean "improve articles about underrepresented topics" but rather means "hamstring all articles about topics we already post a lot of". That doesn't make any sense to me. Of course, both technically work, but only one of the two methods (improve underrepresented articles or destroy overrepresented articles) results in an overall better encyclopedia. I would prefer if instead of "Let's make sure that we post less articles about overrepresented things" we instead decided "Let's post more articles about underrepresented things". If your response is "But we don't have enough quality articles about those things" my answer is "You're allowed to fix those articles up. No one is stopping you". --Jayron 32 15:19, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm constantly confused by the idea that promoting diversity doesn't mean "improve articles about underrepresented topics" but rather means "hamstring all articles about topics we already post a lot of"

Yes. Thank you for saying this. Everyone complains about why X type of stories aren't posted, but when X stories are nominated, they don't bother to fix these articles. I think one benefit of implementing this would be encouraging people to actually fix nominated articles since they would have a better stake in it. - Knightoftheswords281 (Talk-Contribs) 18:28, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

A lot of these may still not have been posted, because the event itself does not have an article (there's no article on Jaber Al-Mubarak's death or funeral), or because these articles would be more likely to get nominated for deletion. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 13:08, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Thryduulf, virtually all of those are either not articles about events or are routine news that fail WP:Notability (events). A couple of them are things that were not "in the news" (i.e. they hadn't happened yet). Thebiguglyalien (talk) 14:23, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I wouldn't be opposed to a situation where there are categories of events that always get posted (subject to article quality and a sufficient update) - sort of like ITNR for categories of events rather than specific events. I strongly oppose removing the significance criterion completely, otherwise ITN will be full of trivia about pop culture, sports results, political scandals, gun violence and the like. Exactly which categories of events would be included I don't know off the top of my head, but looking at the current state of ITN the only event that rises to what I would consider significant but which doesn't have a consensus to post currently is Kourakou and Tondobi attacks, but all but one of the opposers are doing so on quality grounds so would not be posted under the proposed regime either. Thryduulf (talk) 12:24, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

People are already free to !vote as you proposed. Per WP:ITN: It is highly subjective whether an event is considered significant enough, and ultimately each event should be discussed on its own merits. The consensus among those discussing the event is all that is necessary to decide if an event is significant enough for posting. In the meantime, WP:ITN should only reflect common practices, a status this proposal has not reached (yet). —Bagumba (talk) 14:53, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't think I've ever hated a good-faith Wikipedia proposal this much. The result would be stories nobody cares about taking up space (of which there is little), while stories that matter to a wide population (and get a lot of traffic) rolling off in a few hours. It would also heavily bias the Main Page toward people who spend their time at ITN and can churn out eight-sentence articles over articles that naturally get updated because they're more important. The current ITN system is far from perfect, but it's a heckuva lot better than this.

Not that it's necessary to spell out, but strong oppose. Kicking222 (talk) 11:21, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

But we don't even blurb all RDs. Kirill C1 (talk) 23:02, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

So, if in the next month editors improve 2023 Fermanagh and Omagh District Council election to the same standards which would get a RD posted, it could get a blurb? And the same goes for the 130 or more other districts on the same day? That seems highly impractical and unwanted. Fram (talk) 12:43, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Excellent question! Maybe yes? Such articles rarely ever get to a high quality bar, so it would be cool when they do! But there's a risk of spammy-ness here too, despite the quality requirements, so it's definitely a valid concern. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 13:12, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

In other words, it would move ITN to being simply a record of what people have taken the time to improve that day. If someone does identikit C-class articles for every distrrict election in Northern Ireland, then they'll all be featured. FWIW I don't hate this idea, I think a more objective system for promoting stories, and an increase of the number of such stories, might be a good way to showcase WIkipedia content, but as written the proposal is not that workable. — Amakuru (talk) 14:49, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

An example of a way to limit this issue, would be to only allow a max of two items per person per week, for example. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 15:00, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

I think the "every nomination with a good enough article gets posted" can become quickly unworkable, but I would support a greater emphasis on observable evidence, and less emphasis on assertions and feelings presented without evidence. After all, my own perspective on what is "important" is entirely based on my own experiences, and if I only supported stories I cared about, that's hardly an equitable and useful way for me to vote. If, instead, I only voted after reading the available source material and checking the content of the article, I can base my vote on things anyone can check, and thus we have a common set of evidence to discuss from. Much more productive discussions can happen. --Jayron32 15:13, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
- Jayron, everyone knows it would be so much easier to !vote based on whether or not I feel something is significant. It's all weighted the same anyway. In other words: What's the incentive to people taking such a rigorous approach? --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 15:22, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
  - If we ignore them when they don't. --Jayron 32 17:50, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Strong oppose I understand the nominatior's "mission statement", that is to lower the amount of fighting that goes on in blurb discussions. However, the solution to that isn't to make it an absolute free-for-all, where every little election or run-of-the-mill shooting that gets to C-class gets posted. This is the most nuclear of the nuclear options. Curbon7 (talk) 21:31, 18 April 2023 (UTC)
Reducing the fighting is a relatively low priority compared to getting rid of the constant WP:OR. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 14:34, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Strongest possible support - I would like to sincerely thank @Thebiguglyalien for doing what I've been contemplating about doing for a while and what I was finally about to do after @Fakescientist8000's request in the Finland nomination. I would also like to thank @Snow Rise's comment under my Tyre Nichols post (see the bottom of the nomination) for really ushering in this thought into my mind. Just like them, I have become completely appalled with how unanchored Wikipedia:In The News/Candidates has become from WP:OR, WP:IDONTLIKEIT, WP:WEIGHT, and something that he didn't mention, WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS.

ITN's criteria regarding significance makes the grave mistake of not outlining what defines significance and literally admits that it is all up to the subjective and arbitrary reasonings of editors. In effect, stories are not getting posted because of real "significance," they're getting posted based on which editors show up before an admin posts. This has lead to a fundamental lack of structure and order on this part of the free encyclopedia. There's no such thing as long-established consensus on here since the result of older nominations are frequently overridden by newer ones based on the emotions of the !voterbase at the time. It's what has lead to the situations where obscure dart championships are photo-blurbed on ITN for weeks on end, meanwhile events being covered by major WP:RS sources with major ramifications are not being featured for poorly concealed WP:IDONTLIKEIT reasons. I find it worrying that its become accepted that every voter on ITN can have wildly different standards for inclusion. @WaltCip basically has no standards at this point. @Thebiguglyalien thinks that it ought to pass WP:NEVENTS. @Masem thinks that we have to be fighting the bias of MSM outlets (a point I'll get to later). @DarkSide830 and @The Kip have exceptionally high (but not clearly defined) standards. @Curbon7 and @Ad Orientem are more middle of the ground types of folks. @Alsoriano97 is reflexively opposed to anything from the United States. @Editor 5426387 just !votes for the popular opinion. @Andrew Davidson is focused on quality and significance. @Maplestrip only cares about quality. @Nableezy is biased towards American topics. How did anyone expect ITN to properly function when its contributors are all over the place?

Not only that, but with almost every significance-related argument, there are substantial holes. Most are extremely poorly defined and completely untethered from any real Wikipedia or ITN policy, with many very clearly being poorly concealed IDONTLIKEIT violations. To use as an example, I'm going to use the argument utilized by your @Masems and @Alsoriano97s (I hate to call them out, but it ought to be said) of ITN: that on ITN, we're supposed to combat bias by western/American media. We're supposed to not promote stories that are inflated by the media and instead focus on "quality (again, a term that is not clearly defined) and academic subjects from across the world." The issue is that there is nowhere in ITN's criteria where this is even stated, with it in many cases actually indicating that such points are to be opposed. What is defined as quality is essentially anything that editors that are proponents of this philosophy of !voting is basically whatever they think is an overcovered story, which is an egregious violation of WP:OR and WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. Wikipedia is supposed to be a neutral encyclopedia, not a place to WP:POV push and vent your frustrations about MSM. For the people that complain about how news media is blowing these stories out of proportion, you know what we call those outlets elsewhere on Wikipedia? WP:RELIABLE SOURCES. I find it funny that people have been shunned, blocked, topic banned, and all that for going against WP:RS in talk pages and articles, but here, its effectively standard practice.

All these debates about significance have predictably wounded up in the complete derailment of discussion at ITN/C. I get the general impression that we're the laughing stock of the English Wikipedia. I find it telling that the four purposes of ITN (with the exception of one) have been de facto ignored by the community for years at this point. To help readers find and quickly access content they are likely to be searching for because an item is in the news - this is basically been deprecated in all seriousness. Now, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but its not to far off from the truth. How many major news stories - stories with extensive RS coverage with detailed and dedicated articles have we failed to post to ITN because of basically original research, editors not liking the story, and the like? I've seen people say "ITN is not WP:25," which although true, it is an argument that is often poorly used. Stories that receive widespread coverage frequently get featured in WP:25, which indicates that readers are interested in a news story and would be aided by a direct link on the Main Page. Although, I'm not calling for WP:25 to replace ITN, I find it ludicrous that to even use it as a reference source is looked down upon by large parts of the community. Just because @Andrew Davidson uses it a lot? It's very clearly an attempt to counter any arguments about readership of an event on Wikipedia if a group of editors are opposed to a story being posted for whatever reason. I find it absurd that on In The News, nominations for stories that are objectively In The News frequently wound up getting bogged down in needless discourse about "how this is not notable," "how this is overblown," "how this doesn't meet the standards for ITN" (whatever those are at this point). I've seen users unironically use WP:NOTNEWS as a rationale for opposing an article's inclusion on In The News (mind you, this was towards a blurb on ITN, not regarding the notability of any nominated article), a position so clearly self-aggrandizing and obdurate that I struggle in many cases to WP:ASSUMEGOODFAITH.

To point readers to subjects they might not have been looking for but nonetheless may interest them - this frequently gets ignored all the time too, and is a place of great contention. With the significance argument in play, how many stories that are receiving large amounts of coverage get shut down because people deem it "insignificant?" I'd argue in fact that the significance clauses come into direct conflict with this ITN purpose.

To emphasize Wikipedia as a dynamic resource - well, it can't be a dynamic resource if blurbs only get posted once a week.

The only one that of the ITN purposes that is supported is To showcase quality Wikipedia content on current events, which is very indicative of why we should move to basing story nominations off of quality rather than made-up, unclear criteria regarding "significance." With all the bickering on ITN, that's the only thing we can agree on, and is much more objective than the rather abstract significance-based system we are currently cursed with today. There would so many benefits to moving towards quality. Not only would it lessen bickering, it would also provide great incentive to improve articles that have been nominated. I find it hilarious that there's an enormous contingent on ITN that opposed stories for being "too Euro/America/Anglo-centric," yet when articles regarding incidents in the rest of the world are nominated, many of which are in too poor of a state to be nominated, these same people never actually contribute to actually get the article shaped up for positing. By moving the quality, we implement a more hands-on approach that incentivizes against something I really detested on ITN - the massive contingent of editors who will nitpick and bicker about an article's quality, and then fail to do anything to actually remedy the situation, meanwhile the article, if it gets saved at all, is rescued by 1-3 editors who pour their time into building up these articles. I know, WP:OBLIGATION and all, but I really loathe how people will gripe about quality, not do anything to save the articles, and then often times later complain why said topics aren't being featured on ITN more. With a quality-based system, more people will be incentivized to work on articles, thus meaning that we can post a greater degree of blurbs.

With less bickering and more co-operation and content creation, we can actually turn ITN around and actually become the In The News section of the English Wikipedia once more, instead of Wikipedia:The list of abritraily selected news events that we feature on the main page based on the whims of 20 to 30 Wikipedia editors who vote emotionally and dramawhore themselves out to each other like the world's biggest orgy. You know, I hear @WaltCip, like many people his age (he's in his 50s right?) harp about the days of yore - in this case, 2011 ITN. I went there, and was shocked. Conversations were much more civil, the frequency of posting stories was much higher, there were no wild personal standards for posting that were completely unattached from any real Wikipedia or ITN quality, people weren't trying to POV push, right great wrongs, and in general, In The News was actually about stories that were In The News. It's funny how people make fun of some of the stuff that gets featured on ITNR, since they get featured on the main page in the place of more serious stories, and I point I've realized is that since most ITNR topics have been established for close to a decade in many cases, they fitted in an ITN that was regularly updated, and only now really pop out now that ITN has entered into gridlock. I see people like @Fram, @Thryduulf, @Jayron32, and the like making similar arguments to what people were saying about the 2016 RD proposal. "Oh, there are far too many articles, it would swiftly become unatonable?" "What's next, celebrity news?" "ITN will actually be updated on a regular basis just like the rest of the main page?" Just like the opposition for the 2016 RD proposal, I believe these to be wrong, because they look purely at the theoretical possibilities and not what occurs practically. In reality, as 2011 ITN showcases, focusing more and quality and less on abnormally, idiosyncratic standards for "significance," does not lead to the flood of nonsense on the main page, but instead a section of the main page, showcasing stories receiving widespread coverage form reliable sources, stories that are intriguing and enriching to the mind, and stories of quality, all woven together in a beautiful nexus that was and shall be Wikipedia:In The News. - Knightoftheswords281 (Talk-Contribs) 04:15, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm flattered, but I'm afraid you've over-aged me a fair bit. 😊 I was in my teens when I was first editing ITN. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 12:44, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Uh, no Im not, and please dont ping me again if you are going to say something silly and evidence-free like that. Thanks in advance. That I opposed some of your sillier nominations and that you apparently dont understand why is a you problem, not a me problem. nableezy - 14:09, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Respectfully, what would be "clearly defined standards"? I've made my point quite clear that I tend to desire events showing lasting impact. That is why I've opposed certain recent events such as the Dominion settlement (as I've noted, the impact related to an out-of-court settlement is not always significant) and the spy balloon incident (because it never was, and really still isn't, clear what will come of that situation), or why I've supported recent measures to roll back some of the rocket-related ITN/R items (because "first launch of x type" doesn't track as particularly significant). Honestly not really sure what in specific would stand as "clearly defined standards" - I like to believe I've been fairly consistent historically. DarkSide830 (talk) 15:12, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

The problem many people have with that is the somewhat inherent vagueness of "lasting impact," which frequently becomes a way to masquerade poorly conceived WP:IDONTLIKEIT, WP:OR, WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS, etc. arguments. Admittedly, you're one of the more consistent bearers of this line of thinking, but it still is problematic that you and I can have near-polar opposite opinions of each other. An organization cannot function effectively once core aspects are left to be vague and unclear, since you effectively disregard the idea of consensus. Because of this, ITN is less about WP:CONSENSUS and more about who happens to turn up before an admin makes a verdict on the story. How many times, for example have stories been posted based on a "consensus" from the !voterbase from one part of the world was awake at the time? - Knightoftheswords281 (Talk-Contribs) 15:58, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

And an organization can not function when groupthink runs rampant. There is nothing wrong with dissent, as long as it doesn't devolve into unpleasant infighting, personal attacks, etc. I have not and will not ever deny that I am innately something of a contrarian - I won't deny that - but I do believe in what I am saying and believe my rationale for my statements is well-based. In fact, you would probably find a don't disagree with you as much as you think, but in many cases I simply won't vote on noms that appear to be set to pass or fail by a landslide wherein I agree with the majority sentiment. I think you make a good point in regards to the time for which many noms are up. I believe we should keep noms open for longer in a general sense, especially if they aren't INT/R or RD (where the main concern is simply quality). DarkSide830 (talk) 16:45, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Darkside: The standards aren't that complex, it's just that certain people don't want them to be standards, because then they don't get to be the cultural gatekeepers at ITN, which is what they want to be. The standards should be "Is this the sort of story which is prominent in reliable news sources", which is to say "do we expect a sizable number of people who are paying attention to the news learning about this story". If its the sort of story that lots of reliable news sources are dedicating significant resources to cover, then it should pass the significance hurdle. The problem is that people think that they themselves are better arbiters of what is "important enough", rather than following the sources. If we followed the standard of "follow the sources" then we have some standard we can compare to. There would still be disagreement, to be sure; not everyone is going to have the same level of "enough coverage" from reliable news sources, and we can hammer that out in discussions, but at least the discussion would be focused around evidence which is available to everyone to assess, rather than on "stuff I like" or "stuff that is important to me". --Jayron 32 16:20, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree that the standard is that it should be prominent in reliable news sources. And we definitely should be focusing on the concrete question is this something that news sources are treating as significant, demonstrated by depth of coverage and placement of that coverage. But things like Finland opening a new nuclear reactor are not. Things like a Black teenager being shot in the head for knocking on the wrong door are. But the voting pattern for these two events have the opposite emphasis placed on them that news sources have placed. That is, the gatekeeping goes towards both promoting niche subjects that some people want to promote, and towards knocking down those that, for whatever reason (and I have my opinions on those reasons), they want to dismiss. I think ITN nominations should be judged on a basic criteria, is this story front page news at least somewhere, and is our article sufficient to be on the main page. nableezy - 16:52, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure how you'd reach that conclusion about me unless you've only paid attention to the last several days; if anything, I vote support more often. The Kip (talk) 16:43, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

I feel like we might need to workshop a revised guidelines/ruleset for this, so that we have something specific to form concensus around. Some complications have been mentioned in the discussion above, which would be nice to iron out in a collaborative fashion. Currently, any supports and opposes are based on our gut-instincts of what this guideline change would look like, but I don't think that's very helpful. Where should we create such a draft? ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 07:14, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Perhaps start an essay. If their shortcuts become oft-cited, it'd be straightforward to promote a de facto guideline. —Bagumba (talk) 13:55, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Strong oppose effectively because this could open a slippery slope of extremely minor events getting posted to ITN simply because they have an article slightly longer than a stub. Could also end up demolishing the idea of the ongoing section. The Kip (talk) 11:57, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Yeah this is why I suggested drafting a detailed proposal, because I don't think any of this is the case at all, if guidelines are designed with it in mind. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 12:04, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Strong oppose per all above. Small election article is created, two or so media sources pick up on it. Article is then expanded to a mid C tier, and all of a sudden this is allowed on the Main Page. Hint: that isn't good. Cheers! Fake scientist 8000 14:18, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Strong oppose. This is a terrible idea. We're not DYK - posting every minor update to every current-ish event would destroy the purpose of ITN. Many other issues have been discussed above. IF anything, we should be tightening up the ridiculously permissive RD criteria, not copying it for blurbs. Modest Genius ^talk 14:21, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
No ones advocating for posting minorly updated articles - we're arguing for a more streamlined process for article posting. I imagine that even under this, an exception would have to be made for article relating to updated articles, since I will admit, completely abandoning standards in that regard would make way for plenty of clueless noms (even if the potential effects are being exaggerated). But aside from that, I don't see how this will destory the four purposes of ITN (as if they haven't been violated enough at this point), and I don't think that making RD standards more strict will help, especially considering how well it's worked. - Knightoftheswords281 (Talk-Contribs) 15:07, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Comment - I've heard people such as @Modest Genius, @Fakescientist8000, and @Curbon7 object to proposal such as this with the argument that "it would allow minor stories to get onto ITN." May I ask why exactly that's a bad thing? Are more minor stories forbidden or detrimental? They are outlined under ITN's purposes as being able to be included even if readers aren't actively looking for them. I understand the point that is being attempted to be made, but considering we frequently have three-week old photo-blurbed stories, the vast majority of which I'd argue at that point are way more stale and insignificant than fresh "minor" stories, I can't agree. Besides, as I've stated multiple times in the past, why is it that ITN sticks out as a sore thumb on the main page in that we often stay relatively stagnant for weeks on end, as opposed to everywhere else which received daily updates? - Knightoftheswords281 (Talk-Contribs) 15:49, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Oppose. I emphasize in a general sense with the desire to achieve more consistency, but this is simply going too far. This is the position of a WikiNews or even Current Events. ITN does not need to nor should need to post more items. DarkSide830 (talk) 16:28, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Oppose This is a bad idea because significance is the main criterion to tell news of wide interest and trivia apart. It implies that a niche event documented in a short but stable and well-referenced article would be posted ahead of an important event documented in a long article with some issues, which is an example of inefficiency that we'd like to avoid. I also oppose the current rules of posting to RD regardless of significance because of the exact same problem, but it's not time for it now.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 16:53, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

It's outlined in ITN policies that items shouldn't be posted purely because the current items are stale. The Kip (talk) 16:45, 19 April 2023 (UTC)

Oppose - significance doesnt have to be arbitrary, we can institute some standards so as to end the votes like "gun violence is endemic in America" or "prime ministers not lasting their terms are endemic in the UK", but that does not mean every random story one finds in the news is either a. interesting or b. something that people are coming here looking for more information on. nableezy - 17:07, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
Oppose good faith nom per most of the above. Looks a lot like WP:CREEP. Beyond which it moves ITN uncomfortable close to being a news ticker, which I suspect was more or less the point. Community discretion admittedly has its drawbacks and can result in inconsistencies. But it is vastly preferable to an arbitrary standard that ignores or drastically downplays significance. -Ad Orientem (talk) 19:52, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
@Ad Orientem: Thus far, I read "news ticker" as "a single line of news that has no substance behind it"; as in, just posting blurbs without caring about the article that it is featuring. But that doesn't seem to be how you use it here? To me, ITN currently feels more like a news ticker, and this would make it less so. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 08:21, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
In discussions of ITN, "news ticker" almost always means posting any item that is nominated without any filter for significance - indeed this is the most extreme version of that I can recall being suggested (normally proposals are more restricted in subject area). I don't see how this proposal would make any difference to whether ITN is or is not a news ticker using your definition of that term, as there is no proposal to change the quality requirement. Thryduulf (talk) 12:38, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
As per discussion above (mostly my own comments I suppose), this change in philosophy would hopefully encourage higher expectations for quality or a greater focus on the extent of the update. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 13:40, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Oppose - Good-faith suggestion, but this is a massive over-correction. GenevieveDEon (talk) 10:50, 20 April 2023 (UTC)
Support (unless and until a more tailored counter-proposal is made which at least attempts to harmonize guidelines and behaviour for ITNC with core project policies). I'm not a ITN regular--I think I could probably count on two hands the number of posts I have made at ITN since it has existed--so weight my opinion as you will. But what I will say is that every time I have peeked into this space in recent years, I have been fairly astonished at just how massively subjective and based in absolute WP:original research a substantial portion of !votes are, for a large proportion of candidates. Beyond not comporting with basic content policies like WP:NPOV/WP:WEIGHT, there is a pretty flagrant refusal to even adhere to ITN's own inclusion criteria. To be perfectly blunt, if this were almost any other space on the project, I think a non-trivial number of editors here (of both the inclusive- and exclusive-leaning varieties) would have been topic banned a long time ago for refusing to WP:DROPTHESTICK on pushing their idiosyncratic, POV-oriented criteria (or just disabused of the practice). To the extent that I would honestly recommend WP:ANI as the logical next step for arresting these issues, but for the fact that I recognize that it is actually the wishy-washy, far too suggestive/semi-elective tone of the ITN guidelines that is propagating these behaviours.

But something clearly needs to change here to bring these processes more in line with the policies that normally define what is WP:DUE and WP:NOTABLE for purposed of inclusion on this project. I recognize that this is a unique space with a unique function on the project, but that does not obviate it from operating in a fashion that is consistent with core policies, including by maintaining standards which respect WP:NPOV by predicating inclusion in some sort of objective reliable source-based test, rather than the subjective whims of whoever happens to be here for a given !vote. This space has just clearly become far too (and forgive me, this is a little hyperbolic, but its the most apt wording I can think of) lawless, with a free-for-all on every controversial candidate, problematically enabled by this ill-defined non-standard of "significance", which, being completely untethered from sources in a very un-wikipedian way, has instead become a kind of Rorschach test for every user invoking it, morphing to become whatever it needs to be for them in order to rationalize personal POV on what they think is an important enough thing for a person to want to know about. Just a big no from me to that continuing to be the standard operating procedure in this space (or any on this project for that matter).

And if ITN regulars really want to have the greatest amount of input on what that weight test looks like in the particulars, they should act now to formulate them before the wider community realizes just how out of control things have gotten here and imposes the rules with less built-in discretion. That's precisely what eventually happened at the Reference Desks after many years of inaction on the glaring issues that persisted there without being internally addressed, and that space is very similarly positioned to ITN, in terms of having a unique function, but still not being free to toss basic policy to the winds. Sooner or later, this will land at the village pump if the regulars here don't self-regulate and find a source-based standard. Take my word for it. And probably on the sooner side of things. If you want to bake in as much flexibility as possible to avoid overinclusion while still keeping the test based in something other than personal sentiment, the time to act is now. In the absence of such nuanced rules, I support the proposed solution as necessary to bring this corner of the project into compliance with global community expectations, per my thought here, as well as those of Thebiguglyalien, Jayron, and Knightoftheswords above. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 21:28, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

Your points are well-reasoned and well-intentioned, and I completely agree that the way stories are discussed and posted should be changed- I would be happy to judge nominees based solely on the amount of news coverage and quality of article- but this is an absolutely gigantic overcorrection. The Reference Desk and the Main Page are extremely different beasts, and we don't need three-paragraph C-class articles with single-digit view counts about county elections or semi-pro sports leagues clogging up a page seen millions of times per day. I also don't believe that this proposal would in any way impact the outsized influence of people who frequent ITN; rather, it would simply allow some of those people to spend ten minutes writing an article and then getting it pushed to the Main Page. Kicking222 (talk) 01:51, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Why is it so difficult to convince people that three-paragraph C-class articles simply should not meet our quality requirements for ITN. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 06:41, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Well I can't speak for everyone, but I certainly agree with that. Make no mistakes, my !vote is definitely based on a lesser of two evils analysis. I'd be very happy to see a standard promulgated which greenlights only candidates that meet a certain threshold of coverage. But the ITN regulars have had a very long time to get that done and make the process here consistent with pillar policies, and collectively they just haven't taken the importance of making standards that work within those policies seriously enough to get that done. I'm not keen on opening the floodgates to overinclusion, but I think it's more defensible under policy than the alternative of indefinitely allowing the entire process to be completely defined by ILIKEIT/IDONTLIKEIT--which is absolutely and unambiguously what the vague significance standard is, so long as it is un-tethered to coverage in reliable sources and !votes as to whether a candidate is "significant" are instead predicated on the idiosyncratic impressions of individual contributors as to what qualifies as an important topic.

Now the good news for your perspective is that it looks like the current proposal is likely not going to pass, unless there is a radical shift in the !votes as things run along. But I still want to provide feedback that identifies what I think the priorities ought to be here. And I think making the process consistent with the expectation of neutrality as it is meant to operate on this project is the more important factor than fear of overinclusion. Because the middle road option that is undoubtedly the best one (a test based on sources but requiring a significant coverage threshold) shouldn't be put off much longer. I honestly think its best if that conversation be well informed by ITN regular input, so that the exact amount and type of coverage needed for inclusion is calibrated by editors with experience in this space. And if there is much more dilly-dallying, and someone eventually gets frustrated enough to take this to VPP in a couple of months, the ITN voices are going to get a lot more diluted. It'll take some work, but it shouldn't be impossible to create a standard that guards against overinclusion while making sure the call is always based on sources, not feelings. But it will require some here to let go of a frame of mind that personal impressions about the importance of a topic can be a part of a Wikipedia inclusion criteria. That's just not how it works on this project. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 22:48, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

Sooner or later, this will land at the village pump if the regulars here don't self-regulate and find a source-based standard. – Just to make this clear, this was my original intention. The issue has been raised regularly and the majority of participants at ITN have shown little interest in reform or in compliance with policy. This proposal was a last ditch effort to get this corner of Wikipedia to reintegrate with the community before pushing for external reform. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 16:19, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

The problem is that ITN is not a news ticker, which is why a source-based standard can't work, at least as a primary criteria. ITN is on the main page to showcase high quality articles that happen to be in the news, and thus we expect that either a fresh new article to be of good quality, or an existing article of good quality receives a reasonable update. All why ITN was created and given a carve-out on the Main Page.

The Current Events page is set up to handle news that comes out of a sourced-based approach, but it doesn't worry about article quality, which is why it can't be directly on the Main Page. Masem (t) 16:34, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

Masem, your rationale does not track for me here at all--to the point where I am not sure I am even divining the meaning of what you are trying to say. It what ways does the fact that "ITN is not a news tracker" (as a predicate) lead to the conclusion that we should not use a test based in sourcing, as expected for every other standard for inclusion on this project, and as required by a pillar policy? If anything, establishing a source-based test seems more likely to keep the section from becoming an arbitrary list of events, not less.

Similarly, you're presenting a false choice by suggesting we're talking about either a quality standard or a weight standard, when there's absolutely no reason we shouldn't be employing both--for the obvious reason that neither is really negotiable under core policies. And certainly in no way does the current vague "significance" test and the various idiosyncratic, subjective opinion pieces it invites from contributors on virtually every candidate lead to a guarantee of quality, or more or less of a "ticker" feel to the section; rather, all it does is shift discussion to non-objective debate based on the biases of contributors as to what is "important" enough topic to be included. As much as in any other space on this project, we are expected to formulate methodologies to remove the sentiments of editors from the process, and the way we do that on Wikipedia is by looking to the sources, rather than our personal perspectives. SnowRise ^{let's rap} 10:33, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

"May I ask why exactly that's a bad thing?"

Because ITN is for major news, change of governments, Oscars, Superbowl, Death of Queen. Kirill C1 (talk) 23:09, 21 April 2023 (UTC)

One is entitled to that opinion, but it's not an WP:ITNCRIT restriction. —Bagumba (talk) 01:50, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Super Bowl is major news now. A decade ago the discussions on adding that to ITN were longer than the actual articles. Progress, I think? Howard the Duck (talk) 02:19, 22 April 2023 (UTC)

Establishing notability for current events

Motivation

The "In the news" (ITN) has recently seen several nominations of varying notability within the United States itself. These nominations have attracted a faction of users—myself included—who believe it is not ITN's responsibility to cover every event regarding a particular geographic region. Detractors of this school of thought have pointed to the ambiguous nature of WP:ITNSIGNIF and the suggestive tone of the signifiance of ITN nominations, that it is merely guidance to avoid submitting geographically isolated stories, or the classic line, "Please do not oppose an item solely because the event is only relating to a single country, or failing to relate to one. This applies to a high percentage of the content we post and is generally unproductive". While any user may suggest a newsworthy topic, it is clear that there is established consensus that some stories hold more weight than others; such consensus will be discussed in several paragraphs.

Establishing notability extends beyond the recent U.S. nomination imbroglio. In March, a user nominated the release of GPT-4 to ITN. The overwhelming response was against posting; aptly, "Companies doing company things". This consensus was formed on the collective belief that product releases are not suitable for ITN. While I argue not that it is in any regard incorrect, how did this consensus form, lacking an official guideline?

Rationale

The responsibility is ultimately within the Wikipedia community to establish consensus themselves, and textbook policies—as I will describe—are not to be treated as absolutes. However, the ambiguity around ITNSIGNIF will, and has, intensified discussions. The solution is to establish a policy in which all editors can follow.

The work of establishing notability guidelines for ITN is neither feasible nor easily done. There are currently several principles for nominations, verbatim:

The length and depth of coverage itself
The number of unique articles about the topic
The frequency of updates about the topic
The types of news sources reporting the story

These principles omit several glaring guidelines; for one, triviality remains to be seen in these principles. Remaining deliberately broad here is not an oversight in the system, but an intentional decision to ensure equitable nominations, and I respect that.

Implementation

The use of "historically" in ITNSIGNIF suggests that a majority of users, at the time of writing, believed in notability across all regions of the Earth. Building off of this consensus, it is fair to say that there must be clear notability from a variety of geographically isolated sources. In spite of such a restriction, it may still be advantageous to some users to insert even one article from outside of the source country in order to meet this. It is then that this must be taken with WP:COMMONSENSE. It behooves English Wikipedia to eliminate systemic bias, including its coverage of notable events. It is, of course, not inherently despicable to nominate an article from one's home country, but one must understand how Wikipedia used worldwide. It is then increasingly difficult for corporate news to enter ITN.

It is also of the interest of these "conservative users", again, myself included, to accomodate for a growing number of new users who seek to make an impact in ways ranging from constructive to destructive. This should be met with appreciation, but reserved accomodation. If ITN shifts towards the consensus of a U.S.-focused majority, it is the larger role of systemic bias to blame for this shift, not the policy in which these users developed and contributed to this bias. One must also note here that there may be a personal or self-centered reason for nominating ITN articles that extends beyond "making an impact", but such a conclusion may only be made with clear evidence, and it is often that making an impact leads to pride, especially among a younger editorship.

I cannot commend a recent trend of bruteforcing one's way through a nomination through excessive sources, however, which is why it should also be stated that the breadth of a news item is not the only deciding factor in determining notability, although broad coverage certainly enhances an already strong news topic. One can pull up dozens of local news sources in the U.S. to attempt to push an article through, but it should not be seen as anything more than "the bare minimum". It may often be that a user does not see the global impact of a news item, in which case several external sources may be helpful, but the level to which the source list is inundated with internal sources is not particularly beneficial. elijahpepe@wikipedia (he/him) 06:10, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Comments (notability for current events)

I'm sorry, but I have a hard time understanding what sort of guideline or even philosophy change you are proposing here. Are you simply asking for people to stop opposing articles that relate to specific subject matters or specific countries? ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat)

The given rationale's 4 points all belie that WP is not a newspaper and ITN is not a news ticker. While how much a topic is covered in a range of sources can be important, we have to recognize that some topics promoted by the media are day-to-day stories and are not the types of enduring topics that WP nominally writes about, and that's before even applying what should be our attempts to minimize systematic bias that favors English language and Western topics. If we go back to why ITN was established - to feature new articles written to a reasonably high quality of standard within days of a significant event (eg 9/11) - our goal should be focused more on looking at article quality (if new), or the significance and update of an existing high quality article to reflect new events. Sourcing is important, but that should be towards how well those sources can be integrated into the new article or the update. --Masem (t) 12:11, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Masem, when you say the given rationale's 4 points all belie that WP is not a newspaper and ITN is not a news ticker, I want to be sure I understand what you mean when you say "belie". Are you suggesting that those four principles are unsatisfactory for determining encyclopedic significance due to the fact that they would be used to push through items that are more useful for a news ticker than for ITN? Because if you are saying that, then we need to exorcise or modify those four principles entirely because that's what is currently listed on WP:ITNSIGNIF. The last thing we want to do is confuse new contributors who experience cognitive dissonance when they see a difference between rules and application. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 12:40, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Its being argued to use those as the only controls, when really those need to be backed off significantly. It is what sourcing is there to be able to develop a good new article or a good, reasonable sized updated to a topic that should be starting point, and that's how news sourcing gets reflected in the selection of blurbs. Masem (t) 12:23, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

I half feel like this was intended to preempt a proposal I had just sent to Jayron32 a few days ago. In any case, I think this is the wrong way of going about it. First of all, I don't actually understand what it is you're implementing. Second, what we instead need to focus on is defining what we actually mean when we say "significance" so that there are consistent standards we can apply to all news stories, without actually drastically altering our process. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 12:35, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

I too have no idea what the OP is going on about. They mention something about a "recent U.S. nomination imbroglio", about which I only remember the OP making demonstratively false claims about an overabundance of U.S.-based postings (at a time when there was exactly 1 such posting at ITN). Other than that, I don't read any actual proposal to enact in the entire WP:TLDR wall-of-text above. What exactly are you proposing? --Jayron 32 13:16, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

I feel obliged to respond to this since it seems to be at the very least subconsciously directed to me to a large extent.

Like @Maplestrip and @WaltCip, I still don't understand what exactly you're attempting to implement. However, I do have to point out a critically false statement in the implementation section: that ITNSIGNIF was created to facilitate stories with wide-ranging notability across the earth. That is not true; for example see what was getting posted to ITN a decade ago. Stories were getting posted with much less "significance" (whatever that means) and at faster speed. Likewise, and I will always say this to the "we need to eliminate systemic bias on ITN" crowd, there's nothing stopping you from nominating a story from an under covered part of the world. Something that always irks me is that these folk are always complaining about how we need to be less Euro-centric in our story-posting, yet users from this clique rarely, if ever actually posts any story from non-western areas; always in stead opting to express their anti-Euro/US-centrism via voting oppose on American/Western stories. Likewise, when these stories do get posted (ironically enough, usually by people outside of this group since this group tend to have ostentatiously and or idiosyncratically high standards for what should be posted on ITN), and they need quality improvement, these folks, who supposedly have a vested interest in expanding ITN's coverage, never participate in whipping up these articles into shape (and if said articles ever are, its rarely done by the clique). That is in fact a grave issue on ITN and frankly a lot of Wikipedia. The few people who complain, talk, dramawhore, and stonewall the most are the ones that contribute the least to actually improving ITN, whereas the the silent majority of editors are the ones who actually improve ITN and article content.

Also, I'm not sure why we need to place greater emphasis on "global coverage" considering that this is the English Wikipedia, and the vast majority of our userbase is from the Anglosphere. I understand that English is the lingua franca, and so we will get an additional amount of people outside there, far more than other Wikipedia's get from areas outside the core base of their respective languages, but still, the statistics show that the vast majority of our readers are from the Anglosphere, and I think that the whole "we need to lessen systemic bias" argument is partially propagated by how since Enwiki is the flagship version of the WMF's flagship site, in relation to being the lingua franca, article size, etcetera, there's a disproportionately large amount of active Enwiki editors from outside the Anglosphere, who a) make it seem there are more non-Anglo users than there are for folks in the Wikipedian bubble, and b) are more disconnected from the Anglosphere and thus view stories from here as of less significance. Other wikis often times focus exclusively on their linguistic base (e.g, when COVID was placed in ongoing on the Indonesian Wikipedia, it linked to COVID-19 pandemic in Indonesia). Also, and this is something I've been meaning to ask for a while now, what does implementing "stories of significance on a global scale" even entail? Because if you were to interpret that statement literally, ITN would be updated probably barely over ten times per year. Additionally, considering that what counts as "consensus" on this part of Wikipedia is basically a count of the emotional votes of who decides to show up to a nomination prior to its posting/closure, I highly doubt that "past consensus" would be rigorous enough metric to effectively use.

As for bruteforcing one's way through a nomination through excessive sources, considering that people (including you) routinely use the location of the outlets used for sources as an argument in of itself, I don't see any issue. - Knightoftheswords281 (Talk · Contribs) 14:29, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

To go off on the second part of the first section, as one of the opposers of the mentioned GPT-4 nomination mentioned, well, product releases had never been brought up on Wikipedia as far as I knew, and if product releases were to be allowed, then the ITN box would have at least one product release, or two, or three, or even the entire box, because major companies will continue to make products, because that's what companies simply exist to do.

To go on a more broad view on how consensus form, a simple mixture of Wikipedia policy, and the personal opinion of the editor. The editor has a thought, and it is reined in by policy, I suppose you can say. GPT-4 I find is an example of the latter, because there was no policy about products being released and how that would affect ITN, so it was chosen based on the opinion of the editors, consensus thus forming. Maybe what I'm saying is a massive load of bull, though, you can disagree. TheBlueSkyClub (talk) 15:44, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

I can't verify that it's the most recent case, but the most recent product launch that I can recall was the posting of GTA V being the biggest entertainment launch ever in 2013, and obviously, that was about a record, not the mere launch. Personally, I was totally fine with that blurb, but I'm not sure that I could get behind simply "X is released". Kicking222 (talk) 11:27, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

At this point, I feel like we should be talking more about DYK and its criteria. I know a lot of people hate the "DYK material" oppose, but records ARE better suited for DYK. The obvious barrier is the fairly (and perhaps prohibitively) high bar for DYK inclusion. Instead, DYK currently focuses on (at least in my opinion) a lot of things to which I feel compelled to respond "who cares"? I'm sure the DYK people would disagree, but the issue clearly is a lack of places to put certain news items that aren't up to ITN standards but may not fit in Current Events either. Personally, I would love if DYK became more of an "interesting news" section over what it is now (i.e. factoids about something that you probably have never heard about and likely don't care about). DarkSide830 (talk) 15:00, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

DYK is a different project with it's own standards. It isn't the "ITN rejects bin" and this forum is not the correct place to discuss changes in DYK processes. Take it up at WT:DYK. --Jayron 32 12:00, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Just floating it. This is a talk page after all. Just talking. DarkSide830 (talk) 03:08, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Petr Klíma

(NON-ADMIN CLOSURE)

Marking closed. Thanks for taking care of. Ktin (talk) 00:49, 13 May 2023 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Petr Klíma, an ITN nomination that was just archived, looked to be in good enough shape, having been improved on the last day of eligibility. What should we do here? BeanieFan11 (talk) 00:26, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Went ahead and posted; in an ideal world, fixes would happen before the final hours before they age off ITN/C, but as we all know easier said then done. Spencer^T•C 02:22, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I found more sourcing issues. I'm going to pull it. —Bagumba (talk) 04:28, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

In the future, the correct response is "nothing". Sometimes, an article isn't posted in a timely manner. That happens. This isn't a game or a contest, no one "loses" anything because something isn't posted. If an article isn't up to quality in time, or not enough people have commented to get it up in time, or even if enough people vote and it's of good quality, but the admin corps drops the ball and it doesn't get posted, the correct response at that point is "do nothing, except maybe learn to do better next time around". --Jayron 32 14:28, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Should we move to transclude ITN nominations?

Title says it all. It's a bit strange that ITN/C is the only main page nomination page that doesn't feature transclusions IIRC. Should we move towards doing that? - Knightsoftheswords281 (Talk-Contribs) 00:23, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

If it isn't broken, don't fix it. Noah^Talk 02:36, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

Okay, but maybe you could provide a response detailing why it isn't a good idea rather than fire off a dismissive thought-terminating cliché. ⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 11:44, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Normally the onus is on those proposing a change to state some reason as to why it's a good idea, something I'm not seeing here beyond "other sections of the main page do it"... Anyway, the main thing I'd say is that having individual templates for every nom would be overkill at this project. Unlike DYK, there isn't a lot of process for ITN. Someone nominates something, people support or oppose, and it's posted or not. Often all on a single day. The current system seems to handle this work flow well and is easy for editors and admins to follow. — Amakuru (talk) 13:01, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the proposer has to explain why it's a good idea as well, but I don't think that justifies a snarky seven-word response if there is a good reason not to do it. For what it's worth, I'd concur with your reasoning regarding not having transclusions, particularly given the fact that RD has such a high volume of nominations on a daily basis. That being the case, I'm still interested in hearing the reasoning from the nominator of this idea. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 13:18, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

To be diplomatic, both the proposer and initial responder should take away these notes for improvement. —Bagumba (talk) 13:26, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

@WaltCip while @Noah's response was terse, I don't see any particular issue with it. When proposing a change to the status quo, unless you clearly identify:

What the issue is with the current way of doing things
why it is an issue
What exactly your change is
How it will resolve the identified problem
Any issues that will arise from the change
How you will mitigate these isues

Then you cannot expect people responding to the proposal to go into any detail. Of the 6 steps you've sort of done one of them (3), but not even attempted to address the others. Unless and until you do so I see no benefit to even discussing the suggestion, let alone enacting it. Thryduulf (talk) 13:26, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Seems like this question is: Should we required every ITN nom to create a new wikipage? I don't think this is necessary, most of these discussions are quite short and that method prevents general page watchers from seeing updates (as they would have to know and watchlist every new page in there). What problem is this trying to solve? — xaosflux ^Talk 14:57, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

And FWIW, I think that Template_talk:Did_you_know has always been a hot mess if that is what this would become. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:59, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

One problem with the current structure is that the monthly archive files are huge and so difficult to load and search. For example, see Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates/March 2023.

Having a separate file for each nomination would require a naming standard which is not obvious. Perhaps we might have a separate file for each day but that would complicate the process of moving entries between dates.

Andrew🐉(talk) 10:22, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

Edit: I forgot to add my reasoning and that seems to have derailed the entire discussion, so I'm remedying that. It was very similar to @Andrew Davidson's reasoning. @Xaosflux @Thryduulf @WaltCip @Hurricane Noah @Amakuru. @Bagumba

The main issue with having nominations be apart of the INT/C page proper is that the current system results in archives becoming excessively long. It often takes a hot minute for me to load an archive, and practically the first (as in first chronologically) quarter or even third of an archive at this point can't even be fully conveyed since their size is exceeding the template limit, meaning that once you start heading towards the bottom of a page, the {{ITN candidate}} templates stop transcluding. This could be solved by removing all the text from the page proper and moving individual nominations into their own wikipage, thus reducing the size of the article and allowing for archived nominations to be 100% fully viewable.

Transcluding nominations will also make it easier to directly link to specific nominations. {{ITN Note}} for example has parameters linking towards the nomination discussion for the subject article, however, these links frequently get broken when discussions are marked as "ready," or "Attention Needed," or "Closed," since its interfering with the section link. Sure, we could {{anchor}}, but those aren't entirely full proof either for similar reasons. It will also allow us to directly link to nomination discussions in article history sections and {{ITN talk}} without having said links be broken due to rolling off into the archives. Additionally, in ITN discussions, it would be easier to link and access said links to ITN discussions since the pages would load much easier (so in other words, finding the discussion would be easier since folks wouldn't have to wait years for an archive to load and instead just hop towards the discussion).

There are other reasons like it combating accidental interference in other discussions or parts of the page, or possibly being a critical part in providing a more streamlined nomination process maybe similar to DYK or POD, but these two are the primary reasons. I think it would be a positive move that would make ITN more easier to navigate, sort, and use in general. @Amakuru stated that it's not a good reason to adopt something just because other sections of the main page do it, and while in of itself, that is true, I find the fact that we seem to be the only part of the main page content nomination process that doesn't really telling. In fact, although I'm relatively new here, from reading archives of this talk page, ITN has generally been slow to adopt what we today see as common sense (for example, ITN only adopted a main page nomination link in 2014, after years of being shut down because in at least one instance, people were making huff puff about it open[ing] the floodgates to misguided nominations and we should be aiming to include content that readers will find interesting and/or useful, not using it as a recruiting exercise for any aspect of Wikipedia). @Hurricane Noah, just because it ain't broke (which I honestly semi-contest), that doesn't mean we cannot be better. - Knightsoftheswords281 (Talk-Contribs) 03:07, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

No thank you. I see no possible benefit that couldn't otherwise be gotten by doing a different change to the archiving system (like I don't know, just doing March 2023 1/March 2023 2). This is a correct diagnosis of a legitimate issue, but an absolutely out-of-scale solution that would require a ground-up restructuring of ITN/C. Regarding the point about {{ITN note}}, so what? That's such a minor inconvenience. Curbon7 (talk) 03:28, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Well, to be fair, I firmly believe that ITN is long overdue for a well-needed overhaul in terms of nominations, policy, philosophy, and practice in general. We can't just be stuck in the current gridlock we are in rn, since, as I'm sure you, a prolific contributor here will almost certainly have noticed by now, the status quo is not working. As for {{ITN note}} point (and I'm assuming you're also referring to article history and {{ITN Talk}}), reducing it to a minor inconvenience is basically saying that these templates don't matter, but they clearly do as they help keep a historical account of an article that can be used for future references in discussions across this site. Again, to echo my point about special wikipages as a whole, there's a reason why TFA, TFP, TFL, DYK, and OTD talk notices all contain links to their specified discussion page (as well as Xfds, GA-related discussions, etc.). You may as well take them to WP:TFD and nominate them for deletion with that mindset. - Knightsoftheswords281 (Talk-Contribs) 04:03, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't want to be dismissive, because I can see what you're seeing, which I'm assuming revolves around a simple-to-use tool/script like User:SD0001/DYK-helper but for ITN. However, the current method is also simple, just copy-and-pasting the template at the top of the edit box; not as sexy as a slick tool, but it is still simple. A shift to a script/tool would also largely lock out IP users from nominating, unless they want to go through the kit-and-caboodle of manually creating the subpages and transcluding, which a lot of drive-by IP contributors frankly would not have the competence to do.

As no one has said it yet, thank you for your proposal. It is not easy to put yourself out in front of everyone. Curbon7 (talk) 11:31, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

The archives issue is real, but moving to daily subpages would just make it worse at we'd have to transclude more things. The actual solution is to just do two archives a month, or perhaps one archive per week - which would need to be done anyway if we implemented your one page per nomination idea. I also fail to see how making the nomination process more complicated (create a page, transclude a template, then transclude that on the main page) can reasonably be described as "more streamlined"? Opinions of (mostly) different editors about a different issue 9 years ago would struggle to be even less relevant than they are. In short I see disadvantages and no advantages to the proposal. Thryduulf (talk) 08:23, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

There is indeed a minor inconvenience with the archiving process, but I don't see how splitting those archives into separate pages for every single nomination would make it easier to search or browse old proposals. If there are problems with the archived templates and load times, we could either split the archives into more pages (maybe the 52 weeks in the year?), or examine whether the templates can be simplified to reduce the number of parser calls, or substituting the templates when archived. Meanwhile, a more complex proposal system would make ITN/C more difficult to use. Modest Genius ^talk 12:07, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

Unless I am reading this wrong, implementation of this solution, one way or the other, would have no impact on the usability of WP:ITNC. This is a change to back-end archiving process and frequency that is being recommended. Ktin (talk) 17:01, 23 April 2023 (UTC)

I think I posted the above message in the wrong thread. I think it is better suited to the thread below "What to do regarding ITN archives". Ktin (talk) 04:18, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

Minimum quality of a death update for a blurb

I would like to encourage discussion on elaborating the minimum quality of a death update for a blurb as there’s nothing precise at WP:ITNRD. Given that the death is the main story when posting a death blurb, notability and overall article’s quality cannot be the only criteria if there’s only a one-sentence update, which is exactly what we have as a death update for any ordinary person. My suggestion is to set a quality criterion that would require a couple of basic information that a death blurb must include so that it can be distinguished from ordinary deaths. This information includes: 1) the death itself, 2) commemorations/reactions and 3) funeral. Your opinions on this are welcome.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 06:16, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

This neeeds to be balanced with WP:NOTDIARY and a random collection of thoughts and prayers and eulogies.—Bagumba (talk) 06:37, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Looking at the biography articles for which we've recently posted death blurbs, such as Pelé, there's a lot of relevant information related to the death that can be added in line with WP:NOTDIARY. After all, if a person truly deserves a blurb, there should be information of encyclopedic value in reliable sources to support content beyond a one-sentence update (in case we agree on a quality criterion of this sort, we'd have an efficient way to make a cut in contentious discussions).--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 07:03, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

My first thought is that there should be at least a paragraph of encyclopaedic prose about the subject's death and/or the reactions to it, explicitly excluding quotes and lists of obituaries. If there is less than that to be said then we shouldn't have a blurb. Thryduulf (talk) 09:56, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

We've... already got this. Twice. WP:ITN#Updated content: "a five-sentence update (with at minimum three references, not counting duplicates) is generally more than sufficient, while a one-sentence update is highly questionable. Changes in verb tense (e.g. "is" → "was") or updates that convey little or no relevant information beyond what is stated in the ITN blurb are insufficient." And later in WP:ITN#Blurbs, "it is generally inadequate if the entirety of the update is only a sentence, such that no more information is in the update than would be in the blurb." —Cryptic 10:10, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I know that we've got it for the blurbs in general, but it'd be beneficial to have an additional clarification at WP:ITN/RD.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 11:30, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

It says "Of sufficient quality to be posted on the main page, as determined by a consensus of commenters." with "sufficient quality" linked to the ITN quality standards; thus the same standards apply. I don't see any need to develop a separate set of standards just for RD links. --Jayron 32 11:59, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

Yesterday an admin marked and later re-marked a nomination for a death blurb as ready for posting even though there's only a one-sentence update. If we have admins, not ordinary editors, who don't follow the guidelines, then something needs to be done.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 13:11, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

When you spoke with said admin, what did they say? --Jayron 32 13:14, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I didn't approach them directly. My last comment on the nomination addressed quality before the nomination was closed.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 13:21, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

In general, where you have a problem with what one person is doing, the only reasonable approach is to directly engage them. If a person is doing something counter to guidelines, a friendly and approachable conversation to that effect is the only useful way to fix the problem, or at least, the best first approach. Instead of spending all this time here discussing the policy itself, the time spent in collegial conversation with the admin in question would have been more useful. --Jayron 32 15:17, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I’ve always had collegial conversations with other editors, but it’s not about a particular person and their actions at all. It’s a growing chronic problem that admins cannot divorce from their subjective judgement and bypass quality just to get a blurb posted (some time ago, another admin posted a blurb by changing the bolded article, which has eventually become a precedent). I’ve tried knocking on doors to no avail multiple times in the past, and the explanation has always been that our rules don’t strictly prohibit their actions or require something else. So, the only way to change things seems to be by clarifying guidelines because what we currently have leaves editors with a lot of excuses.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 17:23, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

My point was more that the guidelines are already there; if as you claim, an admin (or two or three admins, even) aren't reading them, then adding more stuff for them to not read is a pointless exercise. If they aren't reading the existing, clear, guidance, then why would adding more guidance fix the problem? Maybe they don't know the guidance is there, and they are acting in good faith to post articles based on consensus, and if they were reminded of the standards, they'd say "Oh, terribly sorry, I didn't even know that was a thing. I'll try to do better". I see no evidence that approach has been tried, and it probably should. --Jayron 32 12:24, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

I actually think we should not add a minimum “death update” standard — neither a qualitative one (reaction from peers, communities, etc) nor a quantitative one (number of lines of update, sources being cited etc.). At the end of the day, we post someone’s death as a blurb in recognition of a life lived, of the accomplishments, and of the impact had during the lifetime. If that is the case — the article showcasing the life and accomplishments should be the relevant section of the article and should be a) comprehensive from a breadth of coverage standpoint, and b) levels of quality that stands to our homepage standards. If many years down the line, one were to read an article — while knowing that “A, B, and C expressed their condolences” is nice to read, reading the actual accomplishments during the life would be the main takeaway from the article.

Now, the other side of the argument is — if someone had truly lived an impactful life, there would definitely be reactions to death of the “A, B, and C expressed their condolences” kind. But, if that were not added as well, the quality of the article by itself does not lack anything about the life lived. Ktin (talk) 01:02, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

I think we should have some sort of standard, though it's hard to quantify something like that. A funeral article is typically a good starting point, but a lot of people have information about their death known publicly to the point where it is nearly a formality. And reactions is a no-go in my mind - anyone who is beloved in any way is going to garner reactions in their death. DarkSide830 (talk) 22:40, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Semi-tangent: We really need to remind people, by the way, that "death as the main story" is one of the individual methods through which a death can qualify as a blurb, regardless of whether the person who died is transformative or not. There still appears to be confusion on ITN/C regarding this matter, where people thinking that an unexpected or newsworthy death still can only be posted if the figure in question is a Mandela or Thatcher. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 13:10, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

A move towards codifying the "quality of a death" is a mistake in my opinion, both from a WP:BURO perspective and a simple human perspective. Death stories are case-by-case and trying to qualify death in terms of worth is just a demeaning approach. Iskandar323 (talk) 13:39, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Making Ongoing chronological

It would make a lot of sense to apply chronological ordering to the Ongoing section, which is currently ordered A-Z.

Perhaps the strongest argument for this is that all of the other sections of in the news are currently chronological apart from Ongoing, making it an organizational exception to the rule that breaks the overall consistency of the format.

Another strong argument for this is that it would actually help better contextualize the events, though there are very much two ways of potentially going about this.

Option one would be to replicate the current chronological ordering of the other two sections, which is to display more latest events (measured by start date) first, oldest events last - this would maintain the most absolute consistency with the formatting of the other sections.

Option two would be to do the reverse, with older events first, which one could base on the following logic: older events that are still ongoing are quantitively more ongoing, which as a general rule will likely tend to line up with event significance. In the current setup (4 May), this would place the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine up front as the most ongoing event - a choice that would certainly make a certain degree of sense editorially, and I would suggest does correlate with the event of most significance. However, this option is also weaker from the perspective of overall consistency with the other sections, which place oldest events last.

A largely chronological approach was previously muted when Ongoing was first trialed and approved in 2014, but I can't tell when or why this switched, seemingly informally (I say informally, hesitantly, simply because I see no precise directions in the admin instructions), to an A-Z approach. However, I think a return to a chronological order would have its merits. Iskandar323 (talk) 07:47, 4 May 2023 (UTC)

Not all ongoing events have a clear start date, but I suppose it's going to be rare when we have two items with overlapping vague starting points and if that does happen we could just decide that the one added to ongoing first was the older for our purposes, so that's not really a problem. My gut preference is for option 2 if we go this route, but I'm neutral on whether we should. Thryduulf (talk) 10:19, 4 May 2023 (UTC)
Neither, the alphabetical system works fine for me. --Jayron 32 13:17, 4 May 2023 (UTC)
@Jayron32: I'm not saying it's broken; my point is that it is inconsistent with the rest of WP:ITN. One of the common reasons to adopt an A-Z approach is that the alternatives are too complex to implement; that is clearly not the case here. Iskandar323 (talk) 13:44, 4 May 2023 (UTC)
Given the overlapping nature of the events, it may be too complex, also it's rarely more than 2-3 links. Not really a big deal. --Jayron 32 14:00, 4 May 2023 (UTC)
@Jayron32: Isn't it just being 2-3 links what makes it normally really quite simple? E.g., with the 5 May sample: Russian invasion of Ukraine (24 February 2022 – present), 2023 Israeli judicial reform protests (7 January 2023 – present), 2023 Sudan conflict (15 April 2023 – present) - the start dates makes it as easy as any of the section to order this way. Iskandar323 (talk) 07:51, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

I disagree that it's inconsistent. Ongoing events cannot be arranged chronologically because they are ongoing. You're trying to put a square peg in a round hole by using the start date, but the result is no less arbitrary than the current order. GreatCaesarsGhost 14:28, 5 May 2023 (UTC)
also, your assertion that "all of the other sections of in the news are currently chronological" is not correct. Only one (out of three) is arranged chronologically. GreatCaesarsGhost 14:32, 5 May 2023 (UTC)
RD may be more loosely chronological, but it is still chronological in the sense of newer items being added to the left. Whatever way you dice it, none of the other sections are A-Z - in both other cases, left = newest. Iskandar323 (talk) 20:32, 5 May 2023 (UTC)
"none of the other sections" There are 3 sections, all with different schemes. Your phrasing is clearly trying to imply this is an outlier when only 1 section follows this rule. GreatCaesarsGhost 20:52, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Not sure what could be simple than arranging them by the start date. It is way less arbitrary with either of the two options. With newest left, you have the newest events first; with the opposite, the longest lasting events first. Iskandar323 (talk) 20:34, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

I think putting the most recent additions to Ongoing on the left would be reasonable, as it's more likely to be actively updated. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 08:56, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Proposal: Expand the number of RDs we display?

I've been looking at the number of RDs we have marked as ready lined up and noticed as well that given we only have 5 RDs on display on ITN at one time, potentially we could have the sitation where an RD could get pushed out within 24 hours (indeed Len Goodman's looking like he'll have less than 48 hours). So May I propose that it might be prudent that we expand the number of RDs we display (to 7 or 10 perhaps?) to ensure that all articles have reasonably consistent lengths of time on there and less likely to get bumped if we have a large influx like we do now? The C of E God Save the King! (talk) 11:35, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

We have 6, not 5; also, the readys aren't all posted at the same for that very reason, the admins know to space it out. 24 to 48 hours seems to be the ideal amount of time, not too short and not too long. Curbon7 (talk) 12:11, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
We also cannot control when people die, so there will be periods that maybe 10 RDs are nominated in a day, while others, 1 or 2. We don't give any RD any extra weight unless it can be argued as a blurb. The Recent Deaths link links to all known RDs (not just those nominated at ITN) so people can check there. Masem (t) 12:21, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
It's already pretty packed as it is. I don't think adding more would be a good idea without also coordinating the activity of other Main Page areas to ensure we don't create a balance problem. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 13:03, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
Also, Christ almighty, I've just now noticed we have like 5 or 6 different proposals on WT:ITN just these past two weeks. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 13:05, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

According to WP:ITN/A, "There is a limit of six RD items at a time in the section." Where did this number of six come from? It doesn't seem a particularly good fit. When I look at the desktop view, it's a line and a bit, with lots of wasted space. In the mobile view, it's two lines and a bit with most of a line being wasted again. I reckon any entry ought to get a minimum of 24 hours, even if that makes the section a bit longer for a while. Main page balance is a non-issue as it's not our problem, doesn't affect the mobile view and the current entries are tiny.

But what's really needed is one line per entry with a short description of each person as you get on other language editions such as German and Spanish. Andrew🐉(talk) 15:30, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

The number six came from adding two to four. And if you want to know how we got to four, well that was by adding one to three. And if you want to know how we got to three, the answer is by adding three to zero. --Jayron 32 16:05, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Main page balance is partially in ITN'S realm. the new Vector skin has introduced a number of fun challenges Masem (t) 18:39, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
ITN is already overly dominated by RDs- we post far more of them than blurbs and it produces a real problem with balance. If we're posting so many RDs that even with six slots they're getting less than 24 hours each, then I think we need to look at reducing the number that are being posted, not increasing the number of slots. I would prefer more of our time and attention to be spent on blurbs, not RDs. Modest Genius ^talk 15:47, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
The current problem was created when the posting rules for RDs were modified ~~about a year ago~~ exactly 2 years, 4 months and 7 days ago. Previously, RDs were posted on a strictly chronological basis by order of death (or, in the case of a significant gap in reporting, by order in which the death appeared in the news. 99% of the time this was less than 24 hours discrepancy, so it wasn't really an issue, and only came up on an IAR-level of occurrences. But I digress). So what that meant was, if it took too long for people to clean up the article, they would miss the window when it would appear in the RD list. Sometime about a year ago, we changed it to be "Put the most recently passed nomination on the top, and take the last one off the bottom" What this has meant is that deaths which are not particularly recent still get posted to the top of the list, and get to ride on the list for longer, often bumping down more recent deaths. It's become a bit of a mess. Under the old system, there were less RDs posted, because if you waited around too long to fix up an article, it would be stale. Now, we post stale deaths all the time, and it has made the list run through far too fast. I would propose we return to the old system, which was as follows:

1) Deaths are listed by date of death (in the case where two people die on the same day, put the later posting on top, though)

2) If a nomination passes, but there is already a more recent death on the list, slot it underneath, where it would belong in chronological order

3) If a nomination passes, but it turns out the oldest death on the list is already more recent than the nomination, tough shit.

I think we need to go back to this system. While it meant that some deaths didn't make the list (because it took too many days for someone to either nominate it, or to clean up the article to where it was good enough to make the list), it DID result in most deaths staying on the list at least 3-4 days, which is better than the current system. Basically, we need to be less forgiving of stale nominations. Put them back in chronological order, and if you get it in too late, oh well. --Jayron 32 16:15, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
Support that reversion, it doesnt make sense to bump whats news for whats old news in our in the news. nableezy - 16:48, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

The change was agreed to over two years ago. —Bagumba (talk) 17:37, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
So corrected. --Jayron 32 18:06, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Some of us had done this analysis some months ago and RDs is absolutely not a problem. In fact the number of articles being improved and brought to homepage levels of quality and posted is an absolute WIN for the project and the encyclopedia at large. We also saw the data tell us that posting within the 7 day window had resulted in more articles surfacing to homepage levels of quality and being discovered. If left to me, and I have made the case in the past, that RDs should potentially be expanded to 7 or even 8 - given that the incremental cost is zero. But, there was no consensus for that proposal. C'est la vie. That said, we have other genuine problems including stretched admin capacity and we had seen clear numbers on this front. We need to solve for that and not interrupt what is a good thing. Ktin (talk) 18:25, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
You know, maybe I'll take back what I said about going back to the old standards. If the goal is "being fair to the RD posts so they appear on the main page longer" vs. "Maximizing the improvement of article quality" I'll go for the second option everyday and twice on Sundays. Thanks for changing the perspective on that. --Jayron 32 18:46, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
I think the goal should be to have the most up to date quality articles in the section regardless of length of time that it is there. nableezy - 21:11, 26 April 2023 (UTC)
However, if there is a tension between maximizing up-to-dateness and quality, quality should always win. I get that we want both, but if I had to chose only one, quality is the most important thing. All else is secondary. --Jayron 32 11:57, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
Yeah I agree there is a minimum in terms of quality, but if we assume to get posted to RD means youve met that quality requirement anyway, the next most important criteria is newest first imo. nableezy - 15:41, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

I could not disagree more. You have the entire thing backwards. ITN is dominated by blurbs (counting unsuccessful/quixotic proposals), which suck all of the air out of ITNC. If you look at most RDs, they get one or two comments. Respectfully, reducing the number of RD slots might be one of the worst ideas I've heard. Curbon7 (talk) 13:13, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Looking at Deaths in 2023, it appears that there are about 20 blue-linked articles per day. My impression that that ITN gets about 2 RD nominations per day so that's about 10% of the possibilities. Omitting the other 90% seems unsatisfactory but I suppose ITN would have trouble coping with them all. Andrew🐉(talk) 12:06, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
We still link to the list of recent deaths. We want to focus on article quality, and most RDs are not up to a standard to even talk about posting on the main page. Masem (t) 12:41, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Andrew Davidson, I nominate a substantial portion of RDs, as I get them from WP:Database reports/Recent deaths. I do not even bother nominating articles like Jerry Apodaca or Boris Budnikov because there is a snowball's chance in hell they would become mainpage-ready within seven days. Curbon7 (talk) 13:04, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
"The admins know how to spread out" - really? Beginning at about 21 UTC, 6 new RD items went to the Main page. When I looked in the morning, one of them got replaced (by El C) after just a few hours, I pointed it out, and it was reverted. Shortly afterwards, it got replaced again by Tone, I pointed it out, and nothing happened. Do we still attempt 24 hours minimum? Then the next one should wait, or we should show more in such cases. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:18, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
The admins are not present all the time, and sometimes an admin checks all eligible RDs and posts them in batch. I do not check for 24h minimum, that would be extra work and in turn some other RDs could be left out... No perfect solution here, apart from extending the current 6 items to, say, 8 or 10? But that would leave less room for the blurbs. Tone 13:24, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
You don't have to check for the 24 hours, but I did. How about restoring the one you removed in addition (#7), as an exception? Another possibility: when posting 6 fresh ones, make a hidden note for the next promoter about "when" that happened. It can of course be ignored. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:45, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

There also isn't a 24 hour minimum written in anywhere. Last summer when ITN was more active, RDs were sometimes up for 12 to 18 hours in high-volume periods. Also, regarding Gerda Arendt's suggestion for the hidden note (which is something I support), an attempt was made to implement this sometime last year but it was rejected by a couple of admins. Curbon7 (talk) 14:02, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
Written or not, 24 hours make sense to treat readers around the globe fairly. Kenji Yonekura was "on" from 21:38 to 9:21 (with a short interruption), less than 12 hours, and the hours when Europe sleeps. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 14:06, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

I was the one who started adding timestamps to when RD items were posted, thinking it was both useful and uncontroversial. However one or two others objected so strongly to this that they went to the effort of actively removing the timestamps. I did start a discussion about it on this page, I can't immediately find it but I don't recall it coming to a consensus either way.

I still support having timestamps there, independently of whether there is a minimum time or not, such a timestamp would be informative and useful - if I saw the oldest RD entry had been posted only a couple of hours previously I'd be far more likely to wait before posting the next one than if it had been there 36 hours. Thryduulf (talk) 21:54, 29 April 2023 (UTC)
How easy is it to add the timestamp automatically to every posting? The five tilde sign substitutes the time stamp. Something like this 17:13, 11 May 2023 (UTC) Is it possible that you add this in a comment next to the posting? Ktin (talk) 17:13, 11 May 2023 (UTC)
At some point in the past, we used to put hidden dates next to the RD posts the same way we put hidden dates next to the blurbs. I have no idea why that stopped, I think it was around the same time as we stopped posting RDs in chronological order, but I'm not entirely sure when it happened. --Jayron 32 17:22, 11 May 2023 (UTC)
Put simply, anything short of adding more deaths would be tedious to do, and adding more deaths threatens Main Page balance and takes away space better used on other things (not to poo-poo the value of RD, but Deaths in [year] is a better fleshed out version of this section and we should focus more on leading people there because of said...fleshyness). If anything, we should focus on improving the Deaths in [year] pages. DarkSide830 (talk) 22:45, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
To summarize my various comments above, there is a non-issue here. RD is for the most part working as intended. There may be slow cycles where RDs hang around for several days, or fast cycles where they may hang around for a day or less, but in the vast majority of cases, RDs will hang around for the ideal period of one to two days. As stated (excellently) above, ITN, like all the other mainpage areas, is about showing off quality content. In that vein, I find some of the comments on undermining RD, particularly reducing the number that are being posted, silly. Curbon7 (talk) 22:07, 29 April 2023 (UTC)
Opposed to adding additional RDs. It may be worth having a separate "holding pool" (can't find the particular discussion in the archive) that when an article is ready goes there, and then articles from that list are automatically posted to ITN by a bot at a rate determined by the number of items posted over the past month (whether that is 22 hours or 36, etc.), which takes some of the "bolus posting" out and would lead to more similar posting durations. At least previously, we haven't had a high enough sustained rate of RDs being posted for the technical effort to do this to be worthwhile, but one idea to consider. Spencer^T•C 12:12, 9 May 2023 (UTC)
As an admin who sometimes posts RDs, I would be fine with upping the count to 8, either always or when there are only 3 or 4 shorter ITN headlines. I would also be fine with adding hidden timestamps and possibly having 7 or 8 shown (assuming 6 remains the default) if the oldest RD has not been on the Main Page for a particularly long time. -- Kicking222 (talk) 22:24, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

(Closed) World Rally Championship - ITNR remove/recertify

An involved non-admin closure, but it's safe to say the consensus holds that this event may remain on ITN/R, on account of its regular posting and being a top event in the sport. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 12:33, 16 May 2023 (UTC) (non-admin closure)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

WP:ITN/R states that "Items which are listed on this page are considered to have already satisfied the 'importance' criterion." Some contributors (myself included) believe that this language suggests that items should be subject to periodic review to ensure that consensus remains. The World Rally Championship is one of the few remaining items on ITN/R that does not currently show a citation to the discussion that added it. As such, I would like to initiate a discussion to provide this citation. GreatCaesarsGhost 19:34, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Keep as nominator. Rallying seems to be unique amongst the other motorsports listed at ITN/R. The specific event is the premier event for rallying, and has significant & broad appeal. The annual nomination is routinely posted with little to no opposition, with the year-specific target being well-composed prose and citation to multiple quality sources. GreatCaesarsGhost 19:34, 11 May 2023 (UTC)
Keep only rally event at ITNR, and regularly proved to be posted year after year. --Masem (t) 20:37, 11 May 2023 (UTC)
Keep I checked, and it's been posted every year since 2018. Seems to not be a problem to continue to keep it on the list, as evidence is we post it every year. --Jayron 32 11:14, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
Keep Citing the last 3 successful posts would hopefully have been sufficient too (WP:NOTBURO).—Bagumba (talk) 11:35, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
Keep - not sure I agree we need to have periodic discussions to retain something that is often posted. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 11:49, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Indeed - I did not mean to argue this was a universal opinion or even a majority one. I just wanted to indicate this discussion is not meant to be pointy. GreatCaesarsGhost 13:26, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Keep - I don't think there's a pressing need to have this removed. Wikipedia is not being hurt by the inclusion of this event. --⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 14:14, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
Keep - very popular sport internationally, this competition is the top level of that sport, absolutely no reason for it not to be included. Black Kite (talk) 14:16, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
Remove The recent posting history is a circular argument because being WP:ITN/R gives the topic an unfair advantage. If you look for independent evidence such as this then this indicates that it's a minor motorsport comparable with Formula 2 and Motocross which don't get such special privilege. Andrew🐉(talk) 15:20, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
The World Rally Championship is a competition that takes place across multiple countries and multiple continents, sometimes including one race in the UK, making its popularity among UK viewers completely irrelevant. This is not In the British News. nableezy - 15:40, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

There is no "advantage"; it's not a competition, and no one loses when readers learn about our article regarding the event. The framing of these discussions in such terms is problematic. --Jayron 32 16:09, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
WP:ITN/R obviously provides an advantage to particular sports at ITN and thereby discriminates against the ones that are not so favoured. Here's some more evidence showing that this sport does not merit such high ranking: What Are The Most Popular Motorsports In The World?. Andrew🐉(talk) 17:37, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
I continue to marvel at your unfailing contrarianism. ⛵ WaltClipper -(talk) 17:47, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Andrew, you misread me. The entire frame of thinking that sees this process as a battle to be "won" or "lost" is a problem. There is no battle, there are no winners and losers, and therefore, there is nothing that is an "advantage". Nothing bad happens to you, or anyone, because the ITN box had a posting about the world rally championship. You didn't lose anything, so you were not disadvantaged. That you think in these terms is what I am telling you is wrong. If you want to see an article about a different motorsport event posted on the main page, improve it to where it is a high quality article, and nominate it for consideration. I have not discriminated against those motorsports. You've never even given me a chance to look at the quality of the article and vote for it at ITNC, so don't tell me I am discriminating. --Jayron 32 18:19, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
"advantage to particular sports", when there has been a barrage of items removed from ITN/R recently? Bizarre. The world rally championship is a massive event, the highest form of rally/non-cicuit racing in the world. Pointing to some random blog is a random claim of "evidence". Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 17:50, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

The purpose of ITN/R is not to fast-track a bunch of marginal sports and ensure that every format gets some representation. And it has nothing to do with quality. It's all about significance and the idea is to save time by assuming significance for events that are so outstanding that it's unquestionable. In motorsports, the only event that has outstanding significance in that way is Formula One because it's the only one with such huge international coverage and notability. Rally is comparatively niche and lacking in popularity and so the significance of a particular rally event is always debatable. Andrew🐉(talk) 08:39, 13 May 2023 (UTC)
That's 100% wrong. ITNR is about assuring a good diversity of regularly occurring events of which we know are covered routinely in the news when they happen and that have been generally updated when the time comes. Significance only comes by way of how many ITNR entries there are for a topic (several for association football, few for rally motorsports, for example), but it does not directly reflect significance. Masem (t) 13:19, 13 May 2023 (UTC)
Keep - one story a year is fine for rally racing, and this seems like the one. Though I dont agree with the if it's regularly posted it stays on ITN/R, weve seen in the recent past consensus against retaining ITNR items that had indeed been regularly posted. This should be a discussion about the merits of its inclusion based on significance, not rubber stamping the prior significance discussion on the basis of it passing the bar on quality since then. nableezy - 15:42, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
ITNR has never been a rubber stamp. The merits of the individual event (not the ITNR) are fair game to cover, but the reasons to exclude need to be exceptional or well thought out - such as some of the remote sampling space missions where arriving at the point was only part of the story and we waiting for another point. But we don't want what happened routinely to one of the last few annual Boat Race ITNC, where numerous editors threw up the question of whether the Boat Race overall should be kept. Masem (t) 15:52, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
You misunderstand me, I mean this discussion shouldnt be a rubber stamp on significance just based on the prior nominations being posted when the only thing they needed to post was meeting the quality requirement. nableezy - 15:55, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
My bad, I agree simply already being on ITNR without any evidence of consensus doesn't rubber stamp reapproval. Heck, even those with discussions a few years out of date can be fair game to challenge and don't qualify for rubber stamping. Masem (t) 16:02, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
Comment. I know very little about this championship. However, any request to reconsider the WP:ITNR nature of an event should happen only if the fundamental basis on which consensus was earlier established is no longer true or has significantly changed to the point of requiring a re-evaluation. Ktin (talk) 00:52, 13 May 2023 (UTC)
As pointed out, there is no known establishing consensus for inclusion (the situation for several of the earliest entries on ITNR). This !poll is to revalidate that it belongs or it doesn't as to then use this to establish the consensus. Masem (t) 00:57, 13 May 2023 (UTC)
A simple question to ask is — “What changed now?” Ktin (talk) 02:52, 13 May 2023 (UTC)
I don't think anything's changed outside that currently at ITNR, entries without established consensus are the exception, not the norm, so might as well get it out of being an exception. Masem (t) 02:59, 13 May 2023 (UTC)
Keep of course. I think we can already close this as the outcome is clear.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 08:48, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

When this thread rolls off into an archive, someone (I will try to remember) should add the archived thread to the ITNR list to point to the consensus for WRC as ITNR. --Masem (t) 12:44, 16 May 2023 (UTC)