Maybe it would be healthier to have something that focuses on building more reviewers that are active on an ongoing basis. For example, longer term (over 1 year) there are only 7 reviewers that average at least 2 articles per day and only 19 that average at least one per day. Maybe add an database listing (and eventually awards) of who has gone the most months with reviewing at least 20 articles in each month. North8000 (talk) 19:02, 15 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Seems like a good idea to me. We can do this in addition to a backlog drive. Recognition coordinator @Dr vulpes, would you be interested in exploring this idea further (i.e. setting up a page somewhere, a quarry query) and then executing it (by announcing it and giving out barnstars)? –Novem Linguae (talk) 22:23, 15 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Just to emphasize I think that a visible updated listing is an important part of it. And maybe the 20 should be thirty, and maybe "30 day" periods would be easier to program than months. But I think that looking at ~1 month (or 2 or 3 month) periods is the right time frame. Nothing shorter than a month because even active folks might want to take a 2 or 3 week break or at least know that they can do that.North8000 (talk) 15:28, 16 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think recognizing those who've done consistent reviewing over a period of time is a fantastic idea. I hope it's one that can be made to happen (realizing it's easy for me to say when I'm not doing the work). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 17:52, 16 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
To solidify an idea/proposal it would be to: Add a database listing of those who have who has gone the most 30 day periods with reviewing at least 30 articles in each 30 day period. And later on add awards based on that. North8000 (talk) 15:31, 8 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
It is easier to do this on a monthly basis (instead of 30-day periods). Also, I've only counted for this year, and only upto November. Minor changes are needed to add the data for December (when the month is over). -MPGuy2824 (talk) 06:34, 9 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@MPGuy2824: Cool. I picked 30 days because I thought it was easier. But is that figure for number of months in the streak? if so, that first one says 53 years. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 18:32, 9 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I replied to you by mistake (I meant to reply to Josh's message). The query that I linked to does not count the number of consecutive months that a particular reviewer has hit 30 reviews. It instead shows (for the period Jan 2023 - Nov 2023) the lowest monthly reviews for that reviewer. As you can see only 6 reviewers (ignoring the bot) reached 30 or more. -MPGuy2824 (talk) 03:23, 10 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@MPGuy2824: IMO getting the number of regular reviewers up would be be a big plus for keeping NPP on firm ground. This would mean folks who are watching and active and likely would "dial up" as needed when the backlog grows. What do you think about trying the "consecutive months that a particular reviewer has hit 30 reviews"? Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 16:38, 10 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The processing that you are asking for isn't easy to get via SQL (at least I don't know of an easy way to do it). It might be possible to do this via a spreadsheet program. You do need the raw data for that for which you can use the results of this query which gives you the reviews done by a reviewer in every month that they did a minimum of 30 reviews. Hope it helps. -MPGuy2824 (talk) 02:33, 11 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Absolutely. There is a blue "Download data" button, just above the results. There are many formats available to download, including CSV and Excel XLSX. -MPGuy2824 (talk) 04:51, 12 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@MPGuy2824:I did it in a semi-automated way. The longest still-going streak is JTtheOG at 101 months and the second longest is a bunch of people at 4 months. Will take some noodling on what to suggest that is doable. North8000 (talk) 15:20, 13 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@MPGuy2824: I was under the mistaken impression that just clicking on your link caused the query to run but now it appears that I was wrong. Is there a way to make it run/update? Sincerely,North8000 (talk) 18:18, 1 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@North8000: I encourage you to register on Quarry. Once you do so, you'll find there's a button that says "Fork". When you press that you'll get that query in your own personal work space and you'll be able to run the query whenever you want. Hey man im josh (talk) 21:10, 1 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've re-run the querry, so you can get the updated results from there. But, I'd suggest that you follow Josh's advice and fork the querry so that you can run it at will. -MPGuy2824 (talk) 02:15, 2 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Hey man im josh:@MPGuy2824: I think I did that and launched it a couple times. Both times it said "This query is currently executing" and then I gave up after 2 hours. Do you think I just need to wait longer or is it more likely that I'm doing something wrong? Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 14:59, 11 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
North, I've had trouble lately with queries that take a lot of time. Since you are only looking at results from 2024, I've tweaked the quarry. The results are now available, but please re-fork the quarry and re-run the results just to see if all is fine. -MPGuy2824 (talk) 02:33, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@MPGuy2824: I did that and tried to run I'd say 5 times and waited to about two hours each time where it just stayed qued or running with no completion. So I've just used your data. Do you think I jest need to be more patient (like let it wait/run all night) or is it likely that I'm doing something wrong? Thanks. North8000 (talk) 21:08, 3 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
So I think that what is confirmed doable is list and award people that do at least 30 edits in every month of the year. And temporarily do the same by quarters starting with Q1 2024. North8000 (talk) 15:41, 17 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I think recognition is good. Please make sure to coordinate with @Dr vulpes so that we are not double awarding anything. What's the proposal exactly? Barnstars, listing on a page? How often would they be awarded? If someone achieves 30 reviews per month would they end up getting a barnstar every month? (which might be too much, should give some thought to our plan) –Novem Linguae (talk) 01:30, 21 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Novem Linguae: Per my post below I was thinking of an award (and being on a permanent list) for doing it every month for a calendar year. And after the first quarter, a listing of who is still in he running for the yearly award. North8000 (talk) 14:20, 21 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I like the idea of a yearly award for people who do X reviews per quarter/month. Let me think about how to do the data management (Come March I will forget what I was doing). Dr vulpes(💬 • 📝)01:36, 21 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I could easily calculate it on a quarterly and yearly basis using the data extracted by @MPGuy2824:'s query discussed above. So after each quarter it would show who is still in the running for the calendar year. Someone other than me (like a coordinator) would issue the award itself. North8000 (talk) 14:20, 21 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Dr vulpes:@Novem Linguae: Quarterly criteria (at least 120 per quarter) would also be fine and has the advantage of somebody not getting booted from the running by just taking a 1 month break. If we want to do this we should announce it by early January (if monthly) or sometime in January if quarterly) IMO it would be a good move to have more editing "horsepower" in place which would notice and respond when the backlog climbs. Also would probably get more regular reviewers in place. A big burst of effort with backlog drives is also good. But when you look at the math, a big backlog (which is only about 2 weeks worth of reviews) is more of an indicator of lack of regular reviewers who notice and respond to climbing backlog. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 16:30, 26 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]
So for those who see this and are interested in being in this, do at least 30 reviews every month. North8000 (talk) 00:07, 6 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Here are the results through February. Each of these folks has done at least 30 reviews for each month this year. If you want in on this, be sure to do at least 30 reviews every month.
@North8000, I think it would be a good idea to create a separate page to document these recognitions, as they might be overlooked if they're just added here. I'd be glad to set it up either in my userspace or on the NPP project pages. Let me know what you think. BTW, have you considered sending barnstars to these folks? – DreamRimmer (talk) 13:05, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@DreamRimmer: Agree 100%. I think it would be a good NPP project page. I think that barnstars would be a good idea. Maybe at the 6 month point and definitely for the year. Not sure what the protocol would be to do that on behalf of the project. I didn't want to overstep. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 18:26, 5 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I’m also not a coordinator at NPP, but I try to help where I can. I can assist with maintenance, and when it’s time to distribute barnstars, we can reach out to Dr vulpes, a coordinator at NPP who handles awards, to ask for their help with distribution. This way, our coordination team can use some extra hands. – DreamRimmer (talk) 01:08, 6 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Here are the results through March Each of these folks has done at least 30 reviews for each month this year. If you want in on this, be sure to do at least 30 reviews every month.
Congrats! Here are the results through April. March Each of these folks has done at least 30 reviews for each month this year. If you want in on this, be sure to do at least 30 reviews every month.
Congrats! Here are the results through May. Each of these 17 folks has done at least 30 reviews for each month this year. If you want to stay in on this, be sure to do at least 30 reviews every month.
Congrats! Here are the results through October. Each of these 12 folks has done at least 30 reviews for each month this year. If you want to stay in on this, be sure to do at least 30 reviews every month.
Congrats! Here are the results for the entire 2024. Each of these 11 folks has done at least 30 reviews for each month of 2024. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 19:19, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Should there be an award for these (at least 30 reviews per month for every month in 2024)? You can leave me out. North8000 (talk) 22:20, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The objective was to keep experienced reviewers involved. When I started this I ran the same analysis for 2023 and there was one person who met the criteria. In 2024 there were 11 some maybe it helped. North8000 (talk) 20:09, 18 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I put this adjacent to the large "recognition for consistent reviewing"; please refer to that for context.
I plan to keep doing it for 2025 but slightly changed. Instead of 30 articles every month, I'll make the criteria 90 articles for every quarter.North8000 (talk) 20:20, 18 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Struck. I realized that the query that someone designed for me won't support that. I'll probably do it "at least 30 every month" but calculate it approx quarterly. North8000 (talk) 20:19, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Barkeep49: (BTW I export it and process it further elsewhere) The criteria I used was at least 30 reviews for every month. The intent was to keep active reviewers active vs. drifting off. Per the above I think it helped.....I retroactively looked at 2023 and only one person met the criteria, and 11 met it in 2024. A few active reviewers missed only one month....it could be easy for an active reviewer to miss a month. That was my rationale for my (now aborted) change in the criteria to 100 reviews for each quarter. North8000 (talk) 22:26, 26 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ahh. I misunderstood - I thought you were having an issue with the querry. I didn't understand you wanted to get more people eligible for recognition. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 17:58, 27 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Please accept my apologies for delay in starting to help with this backlog effort. This month I have had very little free time to do this, but I intend to start soon. Storye book (talk) 08:04, 12 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hey NPP coordinators and NPPers, do you think we should also give {{Lesser scribe}} as a barnstar for the backlog drives? Currently there are awards for 200 and 500 points, we can maybe give this to 350/400 or so points? ~/Bunnypranav:<ping>14:08, 8 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
What do the coordinators and NPPers think about more frequent backlog drives? based on File:NPP unreviewed article statistics.svg, the most reduction in pages is done during those drives, but still the lowest was not less than 8000. More freqent drives, like every two three months, can help us reduce the backlog to near zero levels. ~/Bunnypranav:<ping>09:46, 1 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I feel like every 4 months (3 times a year), what we're currently doing, is probably the maximum. Otherwise they will lose their magic. Previously the 4-month cadence has been working great. You can see it in the graph. I'm not sure what happened with this backlog drive... According to the graph, this one was not as successful with mainspace articles for some reason. –Novem Linguae (talk) 13:55, 1 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Every 2 months wouldn't be effective. I agree every 4 months is reasonable, and every 3 months might be pushing it. I'm not sure if people are still recovering from Christmas/new year this January, or if the overlap with the GAN backlog drive had any impact? -Kj cheetham (talk) 15:12, 1 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Kj cheetham When I originally proposed January as the GAN backlog drive month, what I had in mind was "American undergraduate students less busy" and primarily "beginning of WikiCup". February would still work for both of those. But I'm not sure if either this drive or the WikiCup are likely to have had much impact. There aren't that many NPRs in the GAN backlog (though, the co-ords are all either NPR or admins), so I think it's more likely that WikiCup is the issue if it's either of these, but I'm skeptical of that one too. I haven't looked at the ranking tables for the NPP drives, but my suspicion is that one or more of the typically highly active reviewers hasn't been as active this time around. NPP and AFC technically have a high bus factor, but are nevertheless really vulnerable to activity swings in the most highly active reviewers. -- asilvering (talk) 19:01, 1 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I also concur with Novem. A higher frequency would result in NPP ironically becoming a permanent backlog drive. This last drive hasn't been particularly successful, but the reasons are evident and it's not strictly because some of the more prolific reviewers have drifted away - that is an effect rather than the cause. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 20:18, 1 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Me to. Also, they take an absolute mountain of time and effort to do. I found it really hard going the last time, even to do 500. It not sustainable. The impetus would be lost. It needs to be a special event that you take on for a short period of time. Otherwise I don't think it would get done. scope_creepTalk20:39, 1 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'll have the final number soon, but interestingly, it was actually a fairly successful drive in terms of review count @Kudpung, either second or third most all time behind the September, 2024, drive. Hey man im josh (talk) 14:27, 3 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I returned to help out (just a bit) this time after an absence from the process for 2 years and from being a coord for several more. Extremely familiar with NPP since 2010, I have noticed how the average article type in the feed has morphed significantly, making them much slower to review and more difficult to assess. This is why a large number of patrollers are just tagging them for attention and leaving it for another patroller to decide what to do.
NPP is arguably the most important single process in the entire Wikipedia, but ihe moral of this situation is that for the vast majority of the 832 patrollers, NPP has become a thankless boring, soul destroying, activity needing anything up to 6 minutes per article if it is to be done as thoroughly as the rest of the community demands by hanging a Damocles Sword over their heads. Many of those who populate the request page at PERM have clearly bitten off more than they can chew as reflected by the requests for advice at WT:NPR , despite the huge efforts of developers and coords over the years to provide excellent instructions at WP:NPP. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 02:54, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Every bit helps, and that's what I continue to preach to folks in hopes that they'll continue to casually contribute. I like to think I've done a lot in my recruitments efforts, both on wiki and on the community Discord, but there's obviously a ways to go without a singular workhorse to carry the load (@Onel5969, your absence is seriously felt, but we shouldn't have to rely on you to carry so much weight at the end of the day). All we can do is what we can do, and though my efforts I believe have helped, I've felt a bit lost and like I'm vaguely holding onto hopes for things to improve. I'm not really sure where to go from here, but we need improvements/more contributions at NPP. The coord team is always open to suggestions, whether big or small, that could help with getting folks involved or improving the process altogether. At this point... I'm considering proposing that we simply have articles over 180 days old drop out of the queue. Your feedback, and experience involved with such feedback, is always appreciated @Kudpung. Hey man im josh (talk) 03:59, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Every bit helps, indeed, and throughout my 2-year absence I have held regular discussions off-Wiki with various NPP friends about possible solutions. The causes have been well identified but we have pretty much exhausted all possibilities. One idea which I have proposed many, many times is to severely prune the number of NPPers. This would dispel the : 'Why should I sign up for NPP? It's a thankless task, and anyway, with 832 reviewers their team is big enough already', myth which I have heard so often, while nothing could be further from the truth. We get rid of inactive admins, let's look at the NPP deadwood for starters. The basic cut-off is obvious. If they are really interested they can always apply at PERM again for another probationary stint.
I would strongly advise against proposing that we simply have articles over 180 days old drop out of the queue. There is enough crap and perma-tagged material in the 'pedia already. The biggest challenge however, is of course the back of the queue - the articles that no one wants to run the risk of patrolling without the Sword dropping on their heads.
We've seen how some of the patrollers with the best ideas (including a NPP co lead coord) have permanently left Wikipedia for being criticised for just doing their work; you successfully initiate the greatest improvement in the Curation process, do 2,000 reviews, but get one or two slightly wrong, and the community falls on you like a ton of bricks and in the worst case scenario will even wreck your RfA for it. The community at large refuses to accept that NPP is triage, not AfC or some other field hospital. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 04:29, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We've tried everything -- simplifying the flowchart to make gnoming steps optional, increasing recruitment, increasing awards, mass nominating people for autopatrol, etc. -- and so far backlog drives are the only thing that has worked. Oh, and getting lucky with a super reviewer now and then (Onel5969, John B123, etc.), but that is for the most part outside of the NPP coordinator's control and involves a bit of luck.
Backlog drives have actually done fantastic over the last year keeping the backlog stable. If you look at the graph, the unreviewed article count has been holding steady between 8000 (right after a backlog drive) and 16000 (right when we start a backlog drive), averaging out to 12000. The count hasn't really gone up or down, which is great since if it were steadily climbing that would be really bad. Unfortunately, this recent backlog drive is an exception, for unknown reasons, and could be the start of a concerning trend upwards.
At this point... I'm considering proposing that we simply have articles over 180 days old drop out of the queue. I don't think we're there yet, but I think that is the next step if the queue gets completely out of control (maybe >25,000 unreviewed articles). Either that or remove more steps from the flowchart. –Novem Linguae (talk) 11:05, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
We can't have any articles dropping off the qeueue and doesn't matter what size it gets to. They all need to be tracked and checked at some point, even if its not us doing it. We shouldn't be diluting any core processes around article review. The core of Wikipedia is quality. If that quality starts to drop off in new articles, then the reputation of Wikipedia for veracity will be damaged and the whole thing will be finished. At the point it will be a case of upping sticks and just stopping. scope_creepTalk17:44, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'd like to push back against that assumption, that the reputation of Wikipedia for veracity will be damaged. I truly do not believe that most readers would be able to tell the difference between a wiki that is patrolled by NPR and one that is not, for one thing. And it's not like NPPers are doing full source checks on everything - we don't even do that for GAN, or even for FAC past a certain stage. But most importantly, Wikipedia's reputation for veracity is, well... look at the business with the Heritage Foundation or with Elon Musk ranting about the place. Belief in Wikipedia's accuracy (or lack thereof) is more ideological than anything else. NPP doesn't change that. -- asilvering (talk) 19:31, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You are perfectly correct in assuming that '...most readers would [not] be able to tell the difference between a wiki that is patrolled by NPR and one that is not', and they probably don't but that is precisely where readers may unconsciously be absorbing misinformation in unaudited content. Nowhere is this more dangerous than in the contentious topics and paid editing. A mainstream encyclopedia with a reputation to maintain has to be as neutral and factual as its sources permit; we can leave the dissemination of fake news to social media, the tabloid press, deliberately biased news reporting and opinion pieces, and other web based political mouthpieces.
This thread is precisely about one of the new challenges facing the patrollers. I haven't done as many patrols during this campaign as lots of other editors have but I was amazed at the number of sources I came across that were dead on arrival. Readers don't always look up the sources and when they see a plethora of in-text citations, they most likely assume the article to be truly notable and authoritative, Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 09:12, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Remove steps from the flowchart. Or more specifically, narrow everything to the one job that only NPP can do and the only one that NPP needs to do. Handle the question: CAN THIS BE A SEPARATE ARTICLE IN WIKIPEDIA? And thus keeping the review-every-new-article-for-this process functioning. Our problems are the obvious result of making the NPP job overly difficult. Everything else (all of the other problem with articles) relates to ALL articles, not particularly to new articles. North8000 (talk) 19:46, 4 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
the first flowchart The first flowchart (I made it) was very basic and lasted for years; I am partly responsible for the second flowchart because I encouraged it when asked, but I didn't know what we were going to get. An excellent piece of initiative, a useful tool, and must have taken many hours to make, but over the years many newer patrollers have told me the very sight of it almost scared them off wanting to do NPP. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:57, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It should be even simpler: "does this belong on Wikipedia"? Leave the question of whether something should be a separate article to talk pages and AfD, because as you have written about extensively, it's a very murky policy area. If content fundamentally belongs, the encyclopaedia will survive it being on the wrong page for a few years or decades. – Joe (talk) 10:27, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A change that could help reduce the backlog is restricting article creation to EC editors, making non-EC go through AFC; a lot of the time-consuming NPP reviews are those of mass made barely/non-notable articles made by newcomers. DoctorWhoFan91 (talk) 09:45, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think this is possible, as the community would never agree to it. Also, sys admins apply additional scrutiny to ensure that Wikipedia's founding principles are upheld. This sometimes means reconsidering configuration changes that could limit the idea of "anyone can edit".
Aaron Swartz once said in a blog post titled "Who Writes Wikipedia?": "An outsider makes one edit to add a chunk of information, then insiders make several edits tweaking and reformatting it. In addition, insiders rack up thousands of edits doing things like changing the name of a category across the entire site — the kind of thing only insiders deeply care about. As a result, insiders account for the vast majority of the edits. But it’s the outsiders who provide nearly all of the content". Although this is an old quote, it still rings true. – DreamRimmer (talk) 12:51, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, the community would never agree to it. We are not stopping people from editing though, no one can see non-reviewed articles or drafts either way, it's just that with AFC, it won't be in draft space. The link says 2006- things have changed. And restricted article creation would not actually stop "outsiders" that much- random blp/corp can wait a few weeks for article to be AFC-reviewed. DoctorWhoFan91 (talk) 13:41, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't be so sure they wouldn't agree. After finally convincing the WMF that it was a local issue after they vehemently blocked it (with unacceptable PA to our users and admins) for several years, the WMF agreed to a trial for ACPERM and again the final and 3rd RfC passed again with a resounding consensus on a big turnout. If such a suggestion were to be made, the proposal would need to be very carefully researched, worded, and backed up with concrete data that cannot be denied. Putting in mechanisms for keeping the NPP process within realistically achievable levels and at the same time assuring the quality that the WMF likes to boast about, is not an infringement of the misquoted 'anyone can edit' meme, whose original spirit was meant to infer 'you don't need a degree or be a minimum age to edit Wikipedia' Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:45, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The fly in the ointment (well 3 flies actually) comes from a community of hypersensitive inclusionists who insist 1). that Moving to Draft is the devil in disguise. 2). That every article should be done a BEFORE before tagging it for any of the so called deletion processes, neither of which is governed by policy; and 3). Our own fault at NPP by not standing our ground and insisting that NPP, as North8000 reminds us, is essentially a binary process: good enough for mainspace, or not good enough for mainspace. In the latter case there are no less than seven perfectly acceptable avenues for further treatment which are beyond the official remit of NPP. There are several obvious solutions to all this which I won't tempt providence by detailing here and now, but they need to be taken seriously into consideration, and letting unreviewed rubbish drop over the cliff at 180 days isn't one of them. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 07:34, 5 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There are a few IMO problem article-creation areas but I consider that to be a sidebar. I do a lot of NPP's; IMO the most frequent ones are:
Various articles with "stats-only" sources and resultant "stats-only" content. Mostly under what I view as multi-criteria derived topics. And where the only prose content is turning a stat (or factoid) into a sentence. A few stereotypical ones are "The 2021 season of the XYZ team" and the "2019 election in the XYZ district, or the stats for a particular sports event.
"Completionist" efforts for non-suitable topics. E.G. "I'm going to make an article for each stop on that bus/train line"
"Completionist" articles on sports players and coaches where there is no reference that is even 1/2 GNG.
Articles for commercial benefit of businesses, executives, politicians, professionals, artists, performers. Probably mostly by UPE or fans.
Some data will be coming soon (I hope) from an WP:QUARRY , and I will post that when I have it. What we also need is a breakdown (any ideas how to compile it, organise it?) of a recent 1 month sample, preferably the January drive, of new article type basically per user:North8000:, of today's most common creations, broadly:
BLP
Football (soccer) players
Other sport, athletic people and coaches
Businesses executives
Politicians
Visual & Performing arts: actors, directors/filmmakers, musicians/singers, DJs, composers, albums, band tours,architecture, novelists, etc)
Companies
Completionist E.G. "I'm going to make an article for each stop on that bus/train line"
Indian subcontinent
Bollywood (actors, movies, etc)
Politicians
Companies
Settlements
Noting that today's new articles rarely include the traditional encyclopedic topics such as the sciences etc. Authors of such articles generally create pages compliant with policies.
IMHO there's a big one which I think is not fully represented there which I think of as "stats only" "derived topic". "The 2021 season of the XYZ team" and the "2019 election in the XYZ district, or the stats for a particular sports event/tournament. North8000 (talk) 16:37, 7 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. These tend to be straight copy/paste articles from some sports stats site, or two. There is so many of them now I wouldn't have believed it 10 years ago. It is quite a vast duplication of effort. On the genuine articles that you'd find a traditional encyclopeadia, I used to count them years ago, when I first started. I was about 1:20 to 1:30. Now I suspect, but dont know for sure - it would be subjective, it could be as low as 1:50-1:60. scope_creepTalk11:16, 8 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think LLM creations are quite so critical at the moment. We don't want a complete breakdown of every kind of article. What we need are some basic representative stats to reinforce an argument for some action like I did for ACTRIAL. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 11:38, 8 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That list I made covers by no means all types of articles. It's just the overwhelming majority of genres drawn from my experience of patrolling this last drive. I looked at all the new articles, but I do admit to have been selective of what I actually worked on, going mainly for the low hanging fruit. What matters is getting the stats because that will determine what we do next, and I don;t think we can enlist the help of the WMG Growth Team ths time. The WishList people have already ruled it out. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 11:35, 8 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A potential factor I don't think has been mentioned yet is that other cleanup projects (perhaps inspired by us?) have also started to organise regular drives (WP:URA, WP:GOCE, WP:GAN, etc.) to the point that there is now one every month. As a result I've started to see people at WP:PERM explicitly saying that they want NPR because they rotate between the different drives. On the one hand this is a good thing—more recruits, and I've long observed that focusing solely on the intrinsically endless NPP backlog makes reviewers more likely to burn out—but it also means that maintenance-focused editors are spread more thinly and that drives have become routine rather than a special event to get excited about. I wouldn't be surprised is this has made the average drive participant less productive.
And being a broken record, but it has to be said: a very obvious solution to reviews taking too long to do is to stop trying to do so much. In particular, I keep seeing newbie reviewers being told—notably not in the actual guidelines, but through talk page messages, NPP school, off-wiki chat rooms, and the various cheatsheet diagrams floating around—that they are responsible for ensuring that topics are notable, even though WP:N is just a guideline and the community has never, ever asked NPP to take on sole responsibility for enforcing it. We've heard time and time again from reviewers that they find this the most difficult, time-consuming and potentially demoralising (from failed AfDs etc.) aspect of NPP, so why the resistance to telling people that it's just another 'good to do if you can, but don't sweat it' step? – Joe (talk) 09:54, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm always interested when someone writes "Just a guideline". Because, Guidelines are sets of best practices supported by consensus. Editors should attempt to follow guidelines, though they are best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply. (emphasis in the original) So it's not like guidelines are optional they just have more exceptions than policies. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 13:41, 28 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I write "just a guideline" because treating the enforcement of a guideline as an essential part of NPP is inconsistent with how we prioritise all the other policies and guidelines. NPP is triage; we cannot possibly enforce all PAGs on all pages, even though they all should be followed. The things we recognise as essential for NPPers to review for are all policies – WP:BLP, WP:COPYVIO, WP:VANDAL, the CSDs. We generally leave whether to enforce guidelines (e.g. WP:MOS, WP:CAT) to reviewer discretion. WP:N is the only guideline that the 'maximalist' school of NPP reviewing insists is in the essential category (according to seem even the most essential). I wonder if what we need is a revitalised Wikipedia:WikiProject Notability to draw off some of that zeal for enforcing WP:N. – Joe (talk) 07:03, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think maybe we should have a discussion about WP:N too, to see where the actual lines lie; that would help speed up reviews as one would know if one would get blowback for it. And the 'maximalist' school of NPP would be smaller if WP:N wasn't in the flowchart on WP:NPP. DWF91 (talk) 07:11, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes that flowchart has been a pain in the neck for some years now. People should understand that it is supposed to be a visual aid to written guidelines, not a substitute for them (and more or less the opinion of one editor six years ago), yet it continues to be cited as if it's the NPP Bible. Although I would note that all it says about WP:N is that you should check for notability if a Google search doesn't turn up any reliable sources, which is reasonable advice and quite far from "you must ensure all articles are on notable subjects". – Joe (talk) 12:23, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The flowchart does say that notability should be ensured through it's yes and no questions, and whether we need to check for notability is also ambiguous on the NPP page itself. What would be the appropriate location where the correct approach to NPP can be discussed, WT:NPP or somewhere else? DWF91 (talk) 12:31, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I we talking about this flowchart or this one? If the former, you can see that you can only enter the WP:N branch after answering "no" to "Does a google search turn up any reliable sources?" If the latter, yes... but honestly I assumed nobody was actually using that. – Joe (talk) 12:57, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Umm, per the former flowchart we check if the article as is satisfies GNG first, then we search for reliable sources. The WP:N branch you are talking about talks of SNG and then the case where notability is borderline. The whole branch is about varying levels of notability. I don't think anyone uses the latter either, and should not even be called a flowchart. DWF91 (talk) 13:13, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That was a follow-on from this original Can anyone shed some light on why experienced reviewers seem to often leave pages unreviewed? Am I misunderstanding the criterion/decision-making for when a page should be marked reviewed? (bolding is mine) which was only indirectly addressed. The mini RfC was probably not representative and could probably merit a rerun in a way that addresses a much wider sample of reviewers. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:28, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Kudpung: I'm uncomfortable putting my name behind something (aka marking it as reviewed) if I think the page is of low quality and doesn't credibly show that something could reasonably meet any of our notability guidelines. That's why I leave pages unreviewed personally. Hey man im josh (talk) 15:30, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Hey man im josh: I'm genuinely very curious about why you feel you "put your name behind" articles you review? I have never felt this way. Taken quite literally, your (user)name is quite hard to find on the article – it's not in the edit history, you have to now which log to look for. More fundamentally, this is a wiki, so we've never put the responsibility for 'approving' articles on a single editor, not even the creator. That is something that can only be decided by consensus. Do you think people who do gnome edits on new articles without nominating them deletion also implicitly take responsibility for them? – Joe (talk) 11:01, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Gnoming is very different than marking an article as reviewed. You're endorsing that the article belongs on Wikipedia in its current state and putting your name behind such an act. Many of us take pride in what we do, and I think that's an admirable thing. Gnoming is typically an act of improving an article, also admirable, and appreciated, but in doing so you're not allowing it to be indexed by search engines. Hey man im josh (talk) 12:39, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes but this is only checking the sourcing in the article. To me that is distinct from checking notability (which almost always involves external research). Put another way, if the article does not cite GNG-satisfying sources, but doing a google search turns up at least one reliable source, the flowchart does not recommend any further investigation of notability. But yeah, case in point that the flowcharts are not as straightforward as they seem if different people can read them so differently. – Joe (talk) 13:45, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A reliable ref is like halfway to notability though, it can't technically be said that notability is not a concern. DWF91 (talk) 14:52, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Personally, I don't necessarily assume that every article needs to meet GNG, but I also don't think it's appropriate to mark an article as reviewed if we don't think it meets GNG. I know more recently I've seen newer reviewers add notability tags to articles they marked reviewed, which feels contrary to my personal understanding of our role in NPP. If we do not think an article meets notability, we should draftify or nominate for deletion. If the article doesn't have enough good sources, you should do a quick Google to see if there are reliable sources. If sources exist, tag as needing more sources and mark reviewed. If we accept that new articles don't need to meet some level of notability, we can likely accept all the athlete bios and other cruddy articles because they don't have BLP violations, CV, or other "major" issues. Significa liberdade (she/her) (talk) 00:45, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Overall, I think some base level of notability should be required as an NPP check because notability is how we determine which topics should have articles. If we accept new articles as triaged because they don't have major violations, we bring down the overall quality of the encyclopedia, opening ourselves up to a lot of articles for non-notable subjects. Significa liberdade (she/her) (talk) 00:48, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Again, we do except athlete stubs, in the thousands, every month. Many editors—the people that create them, for one—do not consider these problematic or "cruddy". It is fine if you want to spend time checking them for notability but I do not think we can arrive at an appropriate minimum workflow for NPP by identifying batches of articles that are contestably unwanted and working backwards. We should instead be working forwards from the core content policies, WP:NOT and the explicit consensus-based expectations the community has given us over the years. – Joe (talk) 10:57, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Unwanted vs unencyclopedic are very different things. There are plenty of athletes that one could reasonably consider notable whose articles are simply not fleshed out. It at least serves as a starting point for others to build off of. Hey man im josh (talk) 12:40, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
In my mind at least, a significant part of the problem is that reviewers feel like they will be chewed out for marking something as reviewed when they "shouldn't have". If we want reviewers to feel comfortable "lowering" their standards, we need to protect the reviewers who do so from blowback. -- asilvering (talk) 01:10, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Having not taken part in that part of any of the drives, there's only so much my opinion is worth here, but I'd say that's a kind of "call in" rather than "call out". In my experience doing that kind of thing for AfC backlog drives, I think it's been helpful and collegial. -- asilvering (talk) 19:23, 1 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Joe given you agreement on the importance of protecting reviewers from blowback, I'd encourage you to think more tactically about the rhetoric you use. "We should focus on reviewing for policy compliance, with all guidelines being optional" is very different from "Notability is only a guideline" to summarize two different things you've written in this discussion. I think former is more likely to set a context in a way that would help reviewers when discussing this with the wider community. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:38, 3 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
In years gone by we seemed to be fairly firm on the requirement for notability, even mentioning in guidelines for the benefit of those who paste poorly sourced translations from their home Wikis that our standards are higher. I seem to perceive however that the bar for notability has been lowered in spite of the careful redrafting of SNGs. Or are new users and seasoned article creators who are often the source of unpleasant blowback just not aware of those changes? Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 03:52, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think an overarching debate in NPP revolves around our exact role. As has been stated elsewhere in this discussion, some see it as an acute triage to make sure harmful material (e.g., attacks, copyvio) are not on Wikipedia, whereas other are using it to make sure that all new articles are "good enough", meaning they meet certain baseline expectations, including notability. The backlog would certainly be cleared much more quickly if we were only checking for the former, but I don't think it's our intention to mark as reviewed every "not harmful" new footballer article with two database refs. Significa liberdade (she/her) (talk) 04:20, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Define "our"? We have hundreds of thousands of stubs with two database refs (or less) so clearly at some point there was a significant segment of the community that was fine with them. – Joe (talk) 13:08, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
At some point there was, but the community evolves over time, and expectations have gone up. Hence why WP:SPORTBASIC was created, which states Sports biographies must include at least one reference to a source providing significant coverage of the subject, excluding database sources. Meeting this requirement alone does not indicate notability, but it does indicate that there are likely sufficient sources to merit a stand-alone article.Hey man im josh (talk) 13:41, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
SPORTBASIC was a long time coming but what a relief it was when it arrived. It still doesn't alter the fact that a quick look at the feed leaves one with the impression that the new articles nowadays are mainly sports bios and still not meeting GNG, SPORTBASIC, or a sport SNG. With everyone able to create a blog or a website these days however, a newer challenge faced by reviewers is knowing what websites are RS. Dozens of blogs these days masquerade as websites and article creators don't know the difference when they're scraping the web for sources and it's possible that reviewers are also left in a quandary - yet anther reason for the backlogs. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:10, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I draftify everything that doesn't meet SPORTBASIC, and it usually leads to them adding sources later on and moving it back, it languishing in draft space unimproved, or being moved back to main space and nominated at AfD. It's obviously not perfect, but the red line regarding at least one source of SIGCOV at least helps a little bit. Hey man im josh (talk) 15:46, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The problem with SPORTBASIC is the one reference aspect which is used by some to game the system, particularly by the copy/paste folk who take it from their favourite stats site. You see the one reference, its moved to mainspace, then its loaded up with content that is not covered and/or not unreferenced. The guideline need qualified, so there is no confusion over it. I often wonder what the real value these sports articles are to the reader. scope_creepTalk17:41, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I know but that doesn't stop them doing it, unfortunately. I sent 75 articles to Afd at the last summers sprint and about 20-30 were that type. The guideline needs refinement but it wont fix the backlog. scope_creepTalk18:11, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@scope_creepI often wonder what the real value these sports articles are to the reader, IMO,none. At least the one line stubs. The only value is for the WMF who can boast the growth in the number of articles. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:27, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That is the question. I mean who gets final value of these sports articles. Is it the sports fan who now has Apple intelligence on their phone that can quickly pull together any number of facts on their favourite person, particularly on folk who are still alive. It makes a mockery of our efforts. So what is the benefit to us when the reader isn't there? Is it for the WMF in their mad scramble for articles. scope_creepTalk16:45, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think NPPers have to do any checks for notability, full stop – notability is not a concept referred to in any of the CSDs. My personal recommendation, as I've outlined elsewhere, is to look for blatantly non-notability subjects and to investigate further if there are other issues that suggest lack of notability (e.g. promotionalism), but otherwise not to sweat it. But that is less relevant than what I think should be the overriding principle of NPP 'coordination', which is that we should not be telling people that they must do things in the absence of clear, written community consensus that NPP must in fact do them. It is extremely unfair, inconsistent, and demoralising to both reviewers and article creators (who can only try to adapt to our written guidelines, not unwritten rules). There is no such consensus on checking notability and there never has been. – Joe (talk) 10:32, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There has been, but there is disagreement about the exact line. An overarching debate would help- like for me, I leave articles unmarked even when I'm sure bcs I have seen blowbacks on editors bcs they interpreted it wrong. DWF91 (talk) 05:47, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
When I'm in the mood for easier pain-free work and getting more articles done I work on the few-month old articles....mature, but where I'm tagging the failed ones (to give them a chance to fix) rather than AFD'ing them. When I'm in the mood to handle the opposite of that including enduring pain and suffering, I work the older part of the que where the failed ones need to be AFD'd. North8000 (talk) 22:38, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
As long as you recognize your audience and would adjust accordingly (and I'm not surprised given the way I read your intention to provoke with the phrase 'maximalist' school of NPP). Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:31, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Barkeep49: I intended no such thing and I'm not quite sure why stating plain facts (like "notability is just a guideline") seems to have raised your ire so much? Can you suggest a better word for a the school of thought that SL summarised quite well as wanting NPP to make sure that all new articles are "good enough", meaning they meet certain baseline expectations, including notability? – Joe (talk) 10:37, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You haven't raised any ire, so much as an eyebrow at the rhetoric used (which I've pointed out above but can repeat if you want). I'm not sure why the viewpoint you've quoted needs a single word as opposed to "those who think NPP should check notability" which strikes me as a more neutral framing. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:26, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Here's one more piece where I don't quite understand your rheotric. I don't understand how don't think NPPers have to do any checks for notability, full stop can be reconciled with look for blatantly non-notability because, for me, looking at whether or not something is non-notable is a kind of check for notability it's just about the negative rather than the positive form of checking. This is in contrast to the A7 standard of No indication of importance which is completely divorced from the concept of notability. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 15:30, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Glad to hear it. I used a single word because I don't think this is just about notability but a bundle of related issues that tend to place NPP-interested people on a spectrum between thinking we should just check a few critical things (minimalist) versus more broadly ensuring article quality (maximalist). The difference between the two things you quoted is the difference between what people "have to" do and the difference between what I personally do and recommend to others. – Joe (talk) 12:45, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I also totally agree and this is why low hanging fruit are attractive and safe, but it often leaves articles that many reviewers don't/won't touch and they never get reviewed. More often, blowback for assumed incorrect reviewing comes in good faith from new admins who are less knowledgeable about NPP criteria than veteran reviewers are. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 00:10, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Kudpung: Feel free to always ping myself or other regular NPP admins, such as Novem, Asilvering, or Significa, but I actually haven't seen new admins doing this sort of thing. Maybe back in the day, or maybe I've missed it completely. Hey man im josh (talk) 00:23, 2 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Kudpung: While I believe the articles should obviously contain more than database sources, I think a small stub is still helpful in a lot of cases because it gives something for someone else to build off of in the future. Pushing things in the right direction is still a positive change. With that said, I'd obviously like to see better work done on many of them. I'm often personally annoyed at the thousands of old NFL articles I've found that simply are two DB sources. With that said, at least we're doing something to limit the amount of them incoming (via SPORTBASIC). Hey man im josh (talk) 12:42, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I propose we have an actual RFC focused specifically on one thing: to what degree should NPPers check for notability? For example, should we ensure notability, should we only check for CSD, or should we make sure there's at least one good source? Significa liberdade (she/her) (talk) 21:01, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I wonder if that's the right answer. I have tried to not weigh in too substantively in this discussion because I am no longer an active NPP and it feels wrong for me to dictate an answer to another group of Volunteers. On the one hand if the community says "don't check for notability" that could provide relief to reviewers and cover for them to stop. It also probably means the next generation is much less likely to check for it. But in the spirit of VOLUNTEER you can't stop people doing NPP from checking notability if they want. On the other hand if hte community says "you must check for notability" what does that accomplish? And what happens if the overall consensus doesn't match the consensus of people doing NPP because in this case it's not a policy/guideline but a decision about what work a group of people agree to. Instead a way to form consensus among the people doing the work might be a better answer than a true RfC. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 21:25, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A formal RFC isn't needed, but a focused conversation to at least look at one specific issue at a time would probably be helpful. I think a lot of people would be happy to change their reviewing style if a consensus was reached on this matter. Significa liberdade (she/her) (talk) 21:51, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It should be a question of what the community expects us to do, as a minimum – individuals are always welcome to do more, just as many reviewers chose to do gnoming tasks now, even though we de-emphasised them in the guidelines some years ago. What we absolutely should not be doing (and what is unfortunately happening now) is telling new reviewers that they must do X, Y, or Z when the wider community has never asked it of us, dressing down people for not doing, or dismissing people as a "fringe minority" because they say we should just do what is written down in our guidelines. – Joe (talk) 10:25, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'd push back hard against that. If that's what people want, then what's even the point of NPP? Just create a bot to analyze whether something is a likely copyvio, autotag articles, and abolish NPP at that point. Our responsibility is to determine whether articles, in their current state, belong in main space. There are lines to what one might define as belonging in main space, but my perspective is that there should be a reasonable claim to notability. We don't necessarily need to verify and make the decision on that ENTIRELY, but we need to be able to say that it's more likely than not that what we're marking as reviewed is notable, belongs on Wikipedia, and doesn't have enough immediately issues that it doesn't belong in main space. Hey man im josh (talk) 12:45, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm starting to write a "suggested how to fix NPP" . Here's a piece that I have done that is sort of relevant here:
NPP has a huge backlog of articles that need review. The main solution is simple math: Get more reviews. This applies both at the "simple math" level and also at a more mathematically accurate & complex level where the current backlog is a state that is determined by a feedback loop.
The main (fixable) cause of the problem is that it is unnecessarily difficult to do NPP reviews. "Unnecessarily difficult" in turn impacts all of these areas:
Harder to get folks to become NPP reviewers
Harder for NPP reviewers to become fluent, which is a mathematical necessity, thus lowering the number of folks that do so.
Demoralizing, deterring, demotivating folks who want to know that they are "doing it right" which a nearly impossible feat to achieve in any reasonable amount of time
Subjecting NPP'ers to criticism for not accomplishing those nearly-impossible areas. Thus increasing the "pain and suffering" aspect of NPP
Lowers the throughput of article reviewers
Wikipedia has a process which reviews/ screens new articles to decide whether or not an article on that topic is allowed to exist in Wikipedia. New Page Patrol's core mission is to keep that process functional and in place by doing reviews for that criteria. Without this Wikipedia would be flooded into uselessness by billions of advertisements, resume/CV's and other unsuitable articles and "articles".
Keeping this process functioning is the only job that only NPP can do. Every other article problem:
Is NOT unique to new articles
Is something that the other zillion editors can also handle
The simplest and biggest element of a fix is for NPP to change it so that articles are only reviewed for "should this article / an article on this topic be allowed to exist?" aspects
Per what I laid out above.....yes. It's fundamental and inevitable. And it's the main job of NPP. North8000 (talk) 22:28, 4 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I can't agree more. IMO it 's not just fundamental to NPP. It's fundamental to what Wikipedia is all about. If the bar were to be dropped, we may as well scrap NPP altogether and go back to letting any and every user patroll new articles from this page and doing it with Twinkle without NPP or NPR and any notability PAGs at all like we did in the old days.
Now is probably not the best time to redraw what the experienced NPPers best do already and negate the huge efforts of the past and present coord teams and trainers to maintain Curation, the school, PERM, and this page. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 01:53, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Completely agree. If we're not trying to help clean up and filter what ends up in main space, then the processes should simply be automated and we should abolish NPP. Hey man im josh (talk) 12:47, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
To give some perspective on my stance, I personally do not mark articles as reviewed unless I believe they meet a notability guideline, and that is how I understand NPP's role. However, I recognize this is not everyone's perspective, and I've been told I'm wrong for telling new reviewers they shouldn't mark an article as reviewed and tag it for notability concerns. Based on this conversation and others, I feel like many debates regarding the role of NPP come down to this central question: are we supposed to be checking for some level of notability? As can be seen in this conversation, people disagree. Significa liberdade (she/her) (talk) 04:02, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I personally do not mark articles as reviewed unless I believe they meet a notability guideline, and that is how I understand NPP's role. I think this is correct. I think the folks arguing against notability checks above are a minority or fringe viewpoint. Checking for notability is currently central to NPP.
I think that NPP should continue as it is without changes for the moment. I think if the article backlog gets to an extreme number, for example over 25,000, then we should look more closely at possible emergency changes. My ideas for emergency changes include letting articles fall off the back of the queue, flowchart simplification, a bot to apply editors for autopatrolled, relaxing autopatrolled requirements, or autopatrolling all articles by editors with >10,000 edits. These can be discussed more once we reach the crisis. With the backlog at 15,439 today, we aren't at a crisis point yet.
The idea of removing notability checks before the crisis point (i.e. while we have the labor to do the checks) seems like a clear net negative to me. If the choice is to send an article to AFD right away via NPP patrolling, or to send it to AFD years from now when random editors stumble across it, either way it still fails notability and it is still going to go to AFD. So doing it more quickly is better than doing it more slowly. –Novem Linguae (talk) 07:13, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm of the mindset that a dozen smaller changes would be more helpful than a big change that fundamentally changes how we do things. There are things that have been done to push us in the right direction, and we need to keep at it. The answer is basically A) more reviewers, or B) tools that improved the process, or C) streamlined process in some way. Hey man im josh (talk) 12:48, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I plan on working on ideas, but already listed the biggest one ("The simplest and biggest element of a fix is for NPP to change it so that articles are only reviewed for "should this article / an article on this topic be allowed to exist?"") albeit in a way that is probably too vague and abstract. To be more specific, change it so that NPP reviews just for wp:notability, speedy deletion criteria, and entire-article wp:not problems. This will help in all 5 of the listed areas. I think that that alone would solve our problem; but there are more things that can be done. BTW, while my "feedback loop" note says that it isn't this simple, by simple numbers, if we overall got 1% more articles reviewed, our backlog would be at zero. North8000 (talk) 18:38, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That doesn't address whether something is fit for main space in its current iteration (copy vios, entirely unsourced, extremely promotional). An article could be created in main space in some cases but not be acceptable in its current state. That's why the phrasing is important but also difficult to define. Hey man im josh (talk) 18:45, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Novem Linguae, Hey man im josh, and North8000: There have been bigger crises. There was the one way back in 2010 when just 5 of us cleared a massive backlog in just a couple of weeks. It's what gave birth to the development of a new feed and Curation, ACTRIAL finally after a 7 year battle with the WMF, and the creation of the user right. This key article was really a cry for help when the backlog again reached a staggering 22,000 and it exposes the systemic ingratitude of article creators who complain about NPP and don't appreciate the huge amount of work in the background to clean up their crap creations. You only have to politely remind the creator of a poor machine transation to make the required attribution to be met with a diatribe of PA and threats that you're putting them off wanting to conbtribute. It needs a holistic solution, not a change to the way NPP works or evaluates articles, but one that would put an end to the perpetual backlog drives and everyone would be happy. I'm working on developing an idea we had a couple of video conferences about. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 21:14, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Kudpung, I really don't think you'll be successful at changing hearts and minds while referring to article creators' "systemic ingratitude" and "crap creations". -- asilvering (talk) 21:33, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
My opinion is to change that view. Recapping my rationale from above (please analyze what I wrote...it's structural and not just the repetition of the obvious that it looks like) Wikipedia has a process (including flags and required permissions to change them) which reviews/ screens new articles to decide whether or not an article on that topic is allowed to exist in Wikipedia. New Page Patrol's core mission is to keep that process functional and in place by doing reviews for that criteria. Without this Wikipedia would be flooded into uselessness by billions of advertisements, resume/CV's and other unsuitable articles and "articles". Keeping this process functioning is the only job that only NPP can do. Every other article problem (yes, ALL of those 100 other article problems) is excluded from this core mission because they are not unique to new articles, and there are a zillion other editors that can handle them. So it's not "is this article OK?" it's "should an article of this title be allowed to exist?" North8000 (talk) 22:10, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@North8000 Again, as I have replied to one of your the posts recently: 'I couldn't agree more'. Keeping this process functioning is the only job that only NPP can do. We do not need or want to rewrite what we, the NPP team, have been doing as successfully as possible under the fire hose feed, for fifteen years and dramatically change all the good work that has gone into NPP, the school, and the creation of the user right, or the PAGs and SNGs even if they are massive walls of text which we have had to learn to apply. I believe new reviewers need to be familiar with NPP, and also every new admin who chooses to focus on article quality control systems. @Asilvering:, this key article will explain my "systemic ingratitude" and "crap creations" comment. Changing hearts and minds is possible - today's NPP is the evidence of what the NPP team has achieved. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 22:41, 5 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Where we may see things differently (??) is I'm saying that that the "this process" (which only NPP can keep going) only requires reviewing for "can an article on this topic be allowed to exist?" criteria and does not require reviewing for the other 100 article quality/ issues criteria. North8000 (talk) 14:58, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
... "this process" (which only NPP can keep going) only requires reviewing for "can an article on this topic be allowed to exist?" criteria... – That's not the NPP process. It's not about whether the subject could have an article. We don't just mark obvious copyvios or promotional articles as reviewed. Hey man im josh (talk) 15:13, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think that would be a major mistake to weaken any aspect of NPP. It would leave the door to all sorts of abuses that won't be seen. You already get the outrageous stuff that sits for months and that will expand and sometimes it will get missed or misses the 90 cut-off period so the editors doesn't learned anything. There is no doubt that NPP/AFC has led to great improvement in artcle quality, so weakening the process will weaken that result. Its a straight correletion. We will drift back. The core of it though, is we are still seeing those same aberrant editing patterns that should have been removed 15 years ago, that take up so much time. And not just because its new articles. It's new article full of junk that wouldn't be acceptable to a primary school story contest. An example from yesterday was an editor who filled an article with icons, one per sentence. Why isn't the markup editor or the environment capable of warning the editor of this illegal behaviour? Its so basic. For example, AI, which is really good at semantic analysis now, could have have spotted that and warned the editor insead of him wasting time and me wasting time. But it doesn't need to be AI. It could be straight software-based checks (meaning check to implement). There is many of these behaviour, about 60, that take the majority the time to review for us and for other groups to fix. It is the biggest hindrence on improving quality on Wikipedia. If they were removed by using automation, you could do a WP:N review, a quick glance would do instead of the tremendemous amount time and effort we expend now. It worth remembering we are not beholding to the WMF. We are grown adults. They are other avenues. But if we go down that route of weaking the NPP, we are done for. scope_creepTalk16:13, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Lots of good points there. And I'll always note article quality issues when I see them either as helpful guidance or as a note that there is a problem that needs to be fixed. My point is that telling reviewers (and others who want to criticize them) that they are supposed to catch other article quality issues hurts building of active NPP reviewers in many ways and has negative impacts in the 5 areas that I described. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 16:36, 6 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There is a very large articles backlog
There is a moderate redirects backlog
