User:ClaretAsh/Maintenance templates

Tagging proposal

Taken from Wikipedia:Village pump (idea lab)#Cleanup templates -- almost as bad as ads; reduction ideas?

My proposal for replacing the existing tagging structure Perhaps the various tags could be replaced with icons located to the immediate right of the article title.

What I envisage is icons of the same font size as the article title, and in the form of a relevant image covered by a red crossed circle. The nature of each icon may be stated as alternative text (e.g. "This article needs...").

To avoid too many such icons, the current tags could be simplified down to a handful. For example, the orphan and dead end tags could be subsumed into a insufficient links icon. And all the references, refimprove, unreferenced, references-blp tags, some of which duplicate each other, could be subsumed into a insufficient references icon.

When adding an icon, an editor could be forced to enter a concern parameter indicating what is wrong. The concern, (in either WP:USETEMP or tag form) could then be automatically entered into the talk page. Once saved, each icon may then act as a link to the relevant section in the talk page. After all, shouldn't these sorts of tags be on the talk page. Isn't that what the talk page is for. How many times have we come across a tagged article and found that the talk page hasn't yet been created or if it has, it was only to add it to a WikiProject.

The obvious criticism I can see of this idea is that icons may be less noticeable than tags. However, considering how dominating tags can be, almost anything would be less noticeable. Nonetheless, I think readers would soon notice these icons as they wouldn't appear identically on every page if at all. And, of course, serving the same function as tags, they'd still add articles to hidden categories.

LordVetinari (talk) 03:22, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

I just re-read User:Shanes/Why tags are evil and it seems he already mentioned icons there. Must have been at the back of my mind when I thought of the idea described above. Thought I'd add this in case I get accused of stealing ideas. LordVetinari (talk) 05:08, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing me to that essay. I had never read it before. Do we really know that the size of the tags (or the tags at all) draw in new people to edit? More specifically, do we know that the tags draw in new people to make edits specifically focused around hoping to get that tag removed? How can we possibly know if we only stick with "how it's always been done" instead of taking a chance? My personal opinion is that smaller tags would not change a thing for better or worse relative to the already-declining number of new editors. — CobraWiki ^{( jabber | stuff )} 06:50, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

I can't speak for others, of course, but tags didn't motivate me to edit. I read articles on Wikipedia for years before I started editing. Back then, I usually ignored the tags as nothing more than meaningless maintenance stuff. As a reader, it meant nothing to me. When I did eventually edit, it was in response to my own opinion of the article content, not others' opinions as presented through tags. More so as a reader, tags were to me little different to the ads that clog up the dictionary.com website: the reader has to search through the page just to find the text. That's as annoying as google search results that don't lead to pages relevant to the requested search.

My view is that maintenance tags have three purposes:

To 'tag' an article for maintenance (i.e. add it to a hidden category)
- Icons will do this as well as anything
To advertise to the reader that an article has been recognised as being below standard
- Icons, in the form I've described, may fulfil the same purpose. This is especially likely as readers will come to notice that not all pages have icons and those that do don't necessarily have the same ones.
To encourage readers to become editors.
- As mentioned above, tags had no effect in my case. I also don't think people need to be told that a crap article is a crap article in order to motivate them to edit it. People join because it fulfils their needs. That their actions also usually serve Wikipedia's is, in my namesake's words, "a happy bonus". I don't believe people join in because we've just presented them with an article that needs references or needs a copyedit. If they are going to join in, they'll likely start in an area that is of interest to them and then, they'll probably begin by correcting a typo or rephrasing a sentence in an otherwise passable article. To put it in perspective, maintenance is difficult work. For example, I occasionally go on de-orphaning patrols but, despite it seeming like a simple task, different orphaned articles can present different problems requiring different solutions. Just like wikification, refimproving and the others, it is not an easy task likely to motivate the casual reader. Let's entice them with the easy stuff. Once they're seduced, then they'll feel inclined to do the hard yards.

One last thought: I think an editable encyclopedia appeals to that part in many of us that feels compelled to correct spelling mistakes in the newspaper (e.g. see Eats, Shoots & Leaves.

One last question: How many editor's (IP or otherwise) began by dealing with an issue mentioned in a maintenance tag?

LordVetinari (talk) 13:24, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

I was asked by CobraWiki to give my views on this. I believe strongly that turning tags meant for editors into small icons would be an improvement. Tags that warn readers about factual controversy or bias are ok, I think. But all those "fix-me" tags nagging about whatever someone felt like nagging about is not worth the distraction and article ugliness the big boxes bring. The style manual states that articles should begin with defining or explaining the topic. These tags goes against that. In general I'd like article space to be for the readers, and complaints or suggestions to editors on how to improve an article should be made on the talk page, not with big flashy boxes on top of the article. --Shanes (talk) 20:41, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your feedback but thank you especially for "loaning" your idea (see my second edit, above). LordVetinari (talk) 13:36, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Shanes. That's an interesting point you bring up about two types of tags being used in different ways. I certainly agree about the use of the talk page over the article space being more logical for the boxes (particularly since the talk page is where you have to discuss the issues if needed anyway. If the point of view remains that the templates are there to grab attention and too many members keep believing that those tags have more worth in encourage enough people enough to edit and then join and edit than obstruction by being there (which I believe is flawed reasoning as mentioned above), then not even that sort of change would be placed in effect. I'd at least like to at least see a trail period, but that would only happen if some details could be hashed out here otherwise I have no idea if many others agree with the idea (prior to starting a poll). — CobraWiki ^{( jabber | stuff )} 02:32, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps the idea would be more successful if the end result could be rolled out in stages. The concept, as described earlier, actually consists of several ideas. Consider,

Icon/tag design and layout → Don't know what mechanics are involved but changing from one to the other should be a simple case of altering some template pages.
Icon/tag simplification (eg. subsuming {{references}} & {{refimprove}} into a new {{Insufficent references}} icon) → Technically, this is a separate issue, and could be rolled out anytime.
Icons/tags automatically linking to talk page → As above, some tinkering with the template code should enable this. It would also require a major rewrite of relevant tutorials, WP namespace pages etc. Perhaps it could be made easier with the appearance of a messagebox whenever someone tries to add an old-style tag. I expect this aspect of the concept will provoke most discussion.

All in all, justifying the replacement of tags with icons should be the easy part. LordVetinari (talk) 03:18, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

So, umm, I'm not very familiar with this whole Village Pump process. What usually happens next? I'm thinking of moving this discussion to its own page in my userspace so that we can find it more easily. It looks a little lost on this page. LordVetinari (talk) 07:06, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

Another step is to create a poll, but that doesn't do much good without hashing out details here. Otherwise the poll isn't helpful. — CobraWiki ^{( jabber | stuff )} 18:56, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Shanes: "Tags that warn readers about factual controversy or bias are ok, I think. But all those "fix-me" tags nagging about whatever someone felt like nagging about is not worth the distraction and article ugliness the big boxes bring."

Tags indicating unreliability and bias are useful to the reader and should stay in some form. The rest are aimed at the editors so shouldn't take up so much space - either make them smaller or put them at the bottom of the article rather than the top. What reader ever read a tag saying "This article needs to be wikified to meet wikipedia's quality standards" and thought, ooh, I'll join wikipedia so I can learn how to wikify this article?--Physics is all gnomes (talk) 18:12, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes! In article space we should think about and only include information that is useful to those who looked up the article to learn about the topic. If the article is disputed in any way, this is important for the reader to know. But if the article needs wikifying or spell checking or better grammar or what ever, this is not something that give the reader any better understanding of the topic. It is just something that give them information about the article about the topic on the encyclopedia called Wikipedia, but this is just meta-information the reader wasn't asking for.

I find it interesting that the very first, and really the ultimate "fix-me-tag", the stub tag, was introduced and always meant to be included very discretely at the bottom of the article. Since then the tagging has become a screaming contest where every minor flaw that an article might have now has its own tag that is put up on top before any information about the real topic. It's rather rude, I think. If my 85-year old mother wanted to learn more about some subject and looked up the article on wikipedia about it and had to read about wikifying first, she would be confused. I don't think she knows what it means, and, really, why should she? We are here for the readers. --Shanes (talk) 01:20, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

I totally agree with Shanes. If it's about neutrality or such, then at the top is important, but otherwise, stick it at the bottom. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:19, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Fix-me tags that tell the reader that this page is unsourced or needs more sources is beneficial. It screams that you shouldn't believe a word of this --Guerillero | My Talk 17:19, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

So, if Shanes' view is the way to go, another stage would be locating all of these templates in order to separate them into two groups. . . I believe I will safe that task for a latter point if it seems this idea might go through. Fix-it templates on the talk page critical ones on the project page, but I'm still holding on to my original reasoning that each template itself should be made smaller. — CobraWiki ^{( jabber | stuff )} 21:48, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Already started at User:LordVetinari/Template messages LordVetinari (talk) 02:39, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks LordVetinari. I have been busy the past few days (and I can't devote a tone of time to WP anyway). I'll add to it as a I can. — CobraWiki ^{( jabber | stuff )} 19:24, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Sorry for no updates on this issue. I never relized just how many cleanup tags that there are (or sub-tags to cover tiny variations). I've been trying to work on this offline but have caused myself a few headaches just by looking through all of them. — CobraWiki ^{( jabber | stuff )} 06:30, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

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