Wikipedia talk:Former featured articles

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Need to point to article in it's state as "featured" not current "demoted" state[edit]

Can we please link to an example of the article as it was when it was "featured" rather than pointing to the current article? It would be nice to be able to identify what the article looked like when it was "featured". (No record of its featured status is/can be indicated in the page history.). -- Serge Dupouy 21:37, 5 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ahoy. To access the featured version of an article, simply look at the article's original successful nomination page, look at the date it was promoted, and then look for a version around that date from the history.
I feel it would be innapropriate to link the featured version - this is a list of articles that used to be featured, not an archive of formerly featured articles. Wikipedia is a breathing, growing thing; rather than permalinking a version of the page, it seems perfectly reasonable to show it as it is now as it is done everywhere else here - Wikipedia:Featured article does not show the "featured" version, but the page as it is now. It is up to users to see what the featured criteria is now, to improve the article accordingly, rather than just trying to revert it to a previously approved version. Accessing a previously approved version of a page may also be entirely unhelpful as featured criteria has dramatically changed over the years. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> - 00:12, 6 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Repromotions[edit]

Where does Provinces of Thailand go? It is a former featured article, and it was repromoted, but it was repromoted to a featured list. Does it belong in the repromoted section Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 23:37, 8 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No. Its a bit of an anomoly, really. The re-promoted section is for articles re-promoted back to Featured Articles. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 07:33, 9 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Fake FA's[edit]

I found (easily) 2 articles that had the {{formerFA}} tag but are not in the nomination logs. There are probably more. TimL 02:32, 27 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Incorrect. See my note on your talk page. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 08:52, 27 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

What's with the bolding?[edit]

Excuse my ignorance, but why are some of the former FAs listed bold, while others aren't? If there's a good reason, we should probably state it on the Project Page for the benefit of readers. --Alex S 02:09, 22 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Those are probably the ones that appeared on the main page. Raul654 02:16, 22 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The explination is (has been) at the bottom (the "Notes" section). --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 07:41, 22 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The WP:FA page has abandoned this practice—should we do the same? Punctured Bicycle 04:31, 16 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Feh. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 10:01, 16 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
The FA page still bolds articles that have appeared on the main page. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:50, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Why not revert?[edit]

Jesus, there are a lot of fallen articles here. Why is this even allowed to happen? It would be so easy to check out the date the articled were First pronouced featured, and revert back to then! Sure, a lot of edits would be lost, but it seems by far the lesser of two evils... There better be a strongly valid reason why we aren't doing this - Jak (talk) 16:42, 25 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Many of these articles were not removed because they got worse but because the standards for what shouydl count as a FA have gone up. That said there are surly a number of articles that have become worse and fallen off. I suspect that some of these are the results of contentious edit wars (disagreements are a good way to have an article trashed). I do agree that there should be a wikiproject for fixing up former FAs I mean here is a list of articles that are at least close it. Seems like a nice way to add 170 or so FAs with less effort. Dalf | Talk 02:08, 29 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Is there any place on Wikipedia that discusses the problem of articles losing quality and what long-term efforts might be used to combat it? I've seen that some articles, through small incremental changes, get worse over time even without vandalism. They take "random walks", if you will. It seems to me that it makes sense that featured articles should gain permanent protected status where only registered users can edits. And perhaps even for the best articles that are not time-sensitive, all changes must be debated and implemented only then by an administrator. I think the problem of article regression limits Wikipedia's long-term success under the current policies. Jason Quinn (talk) 14:24, 22 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What was the first featured article on wikipedia?[edit]

--Greasysteve13 08:23, 6 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

From what I understand, when the FA project was started all of the articles in the older "brilliant prose" project were promoted to FA at once, so there are many first articles. --Arctic Gnome (talk • contribs) 06:31, 9 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The oldest version of the "brilliant prose" (now FA) page: 11 December 2001. Some "brilliant prose" articles become FAs, some did not. The first FA on the main page was Wikipedia:Today's featured article/February 22, 2004. Gimmetrow 06:39, 9 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Article count[edit]

I have been watching the FA count for a few weeks now and it seems that so far this year the demotions have keep pace with the promotions. However the count of articled demoted here does not seem to be keeping up. Is the (currently 331) number correct? Dalf | Talk 05:40, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, the number (332 after English poetry) is correct - I track it (as well as the FA count) daily. The demotions in January seem to be at the same pace as promotions because we had a backlog over the holidays, with a higher number of demotions falling into January. Also, the FA number at Jan 1 was 1208, so promotions are growing. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:54, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Consolidating category and list[edit]

Wikipedia:Former featured articles and Category:Wikipedia former featured articles (I worked through this list from Gimmetrow and consolidated it into work categories below - skip over this.) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:32, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Name changes[edit]

 Done Starting list of name changes that need to be fully addressed (fix redirects, find original FAC, etc) FARCs found and updated on these.

  • This was changed back to Supply and demand today. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:10, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Need help finding the missing FACs above - all double redirects corrected. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:24, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

    • FARCs all sorted on the above list, found all the FACs I can.  Done SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:10, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Need admin help sorting this out - new name does not follow MOS, I can't move because old name exists.

Um is there a need to move the old FAC and FARC? Template:FormerFA and Template:FormerFA2 both have optional parameters for specifying the subpage names in case they differ from the article names: {{FormerFA|oldfacsubpage|oldFARCsubpage}}, or {{FormerFA2|oldfacsubpage|oldFARsubpage}}. The new Template:ArticleHistory requires the full link to be specified, so it's not a problem here either.
Understood - the reason I'm moving this time only is that, as bot work and templating proceeds, it's very hard for me to match the category with the FFA list when they have different names. By moving these old ones, I can make everything jive. Otherwise, it's harder for me to track who's on first. I recognize it won't be needed in the future, once we get things settled. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:40, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Moved both of them. Yomanganitalk 23:12, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
All fixed by Yomangani - moved back to Strategic management per Taxman's comments on talk page. Thanks !!  Done SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:32, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding the missing FACs, I noticed when looking for one the other day that quite often in the days before FAC subpages (11 out of 25 articles for April 2004) the FAC discussion was removed from Wikipedia:Featured article candidates when the article was promoted, but not added to the correct archive. You'll probably need to look back through the history of this page; if you know the date use &offset=YYYYMMDDHHMMSS to save having to click through many pages, e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates&dir=prev&offset=20031123000000&limit=500&action=history
Over my still-kinda-newbie-in-spite-of-my-editcount head. I saw somewhere someone mentioned a script I could add to my monobook to help locate these things - I may have to get up on that. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:40, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sometimes What links here on the (unredirected) old article bears fruit, e.g. Adoption in Rome was included as the same nom as Marcus Antonius, in Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/Featured_log/November_2003. --Dr pda 20:02, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
ah, that I can do. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:40, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Add RBPs[edit]

 Done List of new RBPs to be added to WP:FFA

(Marskell - can you add those above - former FFAs - to the correct cats on the list, or should I?) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:12, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Marskell, maybe we should hold off on adding these until we understand Placebo's list below - if all of those are former FFAs, wow ! For example, Baseball is a current FA <confused> SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:09, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Allright, now that I've located Wikipedia:Archive/Refreshing brilliant prose, it's much clearer - so we do have this many FFAs, and Baseball should currently be listed in former repromoted about to be demoted for the second time. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:15, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I added the list above.  Done SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:29, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]


Sort out[edit]

 Done Otherwise needs to be sorted out

  • There's something weird at Talk:Beer and Talk:Beer/Tags - may need manual attention?
    • The tags are on a sub page because there are so many, which breaks most of them - could be sorted out by the new template. Yomanganitalk 23:16, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • I left a note for Gimmetrow, reminding him the bot might need manual intervention there.  Done SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:25, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Steer wrestling, which used to be Bulldogging. Talk:Bulldogging was not redirected, so it's counted twice. (I deleted it from Talk:Bulldogging - which should be deleted or something by an admin, haven't found FAC)
    • I deleted Talk:Bulldogging as it was empty. Bulldogging was in the first recorded brilliant prose page: [[1]], so it won't have a FAC. Yomanganitalk 23:01, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Talk:Enclave and Talk:Enclave and exclave - appear to be the same? This looks like another one where the old talk page wasn't moved when the article was moved - ugh - how to fix? (I deleted the duplicate FAR and FAC templates from the old talkpage, but it still needs to be moved or whatever.)
  • Dreyfus Affair - weird thing on talk page, template not used - I don't know how to fix this, or which template to put there - Yomangani or Marskell ??
    • It appears someone manually added the content of the template but not the template itself... I think this fixed. Marskell 21:06, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Something is still goofed up there - links are red and Wikipedia:Featured article removal candidates/Dreyfus Affair doesn't show - it's Greek to me. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:12, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Found the mistake - it's candidates (plural) - sheesh, now I have to figure out where that came from, and if there are others. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:16, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • ah, heck, I need help here - now they're redirecting in circles to each other, with double redirects. Don't know how to fix. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:18, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • Is this fixed or am I missing something? Yomanganitalk 23:16, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
              • I looked again, and it seems fixed. Maybe I was getting old cached versions before? Thanks. Left you a talk page question on Business Strategy.  Done SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:19, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

GA/FFA?[edit]

Now listed at GA - removed from FFA cat - not good:

Fixed in {{ArticleHistory}} by using currentstatus=FFA/GA Gimmetrow 18:41, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Gimmetrow, I noticed that the incorrect current status tag on Super Mario was added manually by RyanGerbil10 and Euro was added by Placebo, probably before you came up with the combo, FFA/GA. If editors add incorrect tags manually before the bot does all the work, will the bot eventually correct them, or should I continue to check the count for mistakes? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:46, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, no, the bot isn't going to be scanning pages again unless they are re-submitted for FAC. Perhaps by then the bot will have code to fix human error. Gimmetrow 21:21, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OK - then maybe we should put an instruction line on the actual template, asking people not to manually insert it until the bot work is done, or something to that effect, and also explaining right on the template that the bot does all of the work of adding closed FAR/FAC etc. info? Otherwise, individual editors might start tweaking and messing things up and adding the template themselves, before you're done? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:43, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Category and list in sync - done[edit]

With these corrections, the counts at WP:FFA and Category:Wikipedia former featured articles agree.

There are 330 articles in the category, which includes Wikipedia:Templates used for featured content, so 329 articles.

There are 343 articles in WP:FFA minus 12 repromoted minus two Project pages = 329.

 Done SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:32, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

New RBPs to be added[edit]

Strike means template added - from Wikipedia:Archive/Refreshing brilliant prose

I might have missed some that are currently featured articles. Also, I didn't add templates to these yet. The Placebo Effect 20:54, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Confused - some of the list above are current featured articles - are any of them former featured articles, or should I check each one? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:05, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Now I understand - we do have to eventually add all these RBPs, but will wait for ArticleHistory to be added. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:36, 29 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Funny thing, the two category topics that aren't articles were already included in the FA count. The Placebo Effect 04:22, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Do you mean the Project pages? Someone told me once that they used to be included in FAs, were FARC's, and Project pages are no longer included in FAs. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 10:48, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
What do i do for the template if the article was moved, just attach it anyway? The Placebo Effect 20:26, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'd say to attach it anyway, and trust me to track them down? I wanted to make sure the list was in sync at some point, but from here on in, I won't worry as much. Also, I can move the FAR/FAC if it gets too confusing, and I think I understand the template enough now to adjust them if I need to move them - I would only do that in cases where the name is so dramatically different that I can't do a crosscheck when we're done of the list and the category. Let me know when you're done, so I can add them to WP:FFA and crosscheck. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:33, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
For example, The Today programme vs. Today programme isn't going to mess me up alphabetically on crosschecking; Business strategy to Strategic management or Bulldogging to Steer wrestling is another story, and those were adding up on me. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:37, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Placebo, if it's extra work for you, you don't have to strike them for me - I have to click on each one when you're done anyway, because to add them to the list, I have to know 1) what the article is about for correct category, 2) see if it's been on mainpage for bolding or not, and 3) see if it's been repromoted. If you're striking only for my benefit, you don't have to do the extra work. If you're striking for your own checklist - no problem for me either - I still don't want to add until you're all done. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:14, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I had posted above two new articles in the category. Do you want to wait on these? It's easy enough to generate a new category vs. links difference as above. Gimmetrow 21:29, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I was thinking of waiting til they were all done, and doing a new sync. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:41, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Added 5 to FFA (Alchemy, Baseball, Paramount Pictures, Today programme, Three Colors: Blue); numbers in sync. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:54, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Failed RBPs and FFAs[edit]

Um, I have been away, so let me know if I have gone off on the wrong track, but are we adding all former "Brilliant Prose" articles which are not now "Featured Articles" to FFA? Quite a few did not make the cut in (IIRC) March 2004. -- ALoan (Talk) 17:15, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, we're adding the ArticleHistory template to those pages per the list of RBPs above. I'm crossing them off as I do them, and making sure that WP:FFA syncs with the FFA category - at this point, it's probably best that only a few of us continue, so we don't get crossed up, and because only Marksell, Joel, and I are on the FFA bot counter whitelist. There are several (already) I don't know how to do - see notes above. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:57, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Just to clarify, it's only the Brilliant Prose articles which didn't make the cut (it was in Jan 2004 actually) which are now being tagged as Former FA. (The ones which were removed from Brilliant Prose before then don't count.) I think the list above is the complete one. Dr pda 20:16, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OK - thanks. Is there any relevant discussion that I ought to read? It seems a bit misleading: they were never featured articles! -- ALoan (Talk) 20:28, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Fine time to say so :-)) OK ... since I'm busting my buns, I'll stop on these for now. The discussion is in at least 3 different places, so we'd better start it over here. I'll try to recap - hope I get this right. As people began adding the ArticleHistory template, I noticed that the category of FFAs was out of sync with the list at WP:FFA. That was because old RBPs were being added via the category on the template. We discussed in several places, and decided to add them to FFA. It makes sense to me for the following reason - there are currently a large number of FAs that are "brilliant prose" - if we have FAs that survived RBP (currently going through FAR - with a large number remaining), why would these be any different? Seems the same to me - they were brilliant prose promotions that were subsequently demoted, so it seemed consistent. If you disagree, we have a lot of work to undo :-) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:39, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, obviously I did not see the previous discussion, nor do I want to put you to lots of work. To avoid going over old ground, where should I look for the debates to date?
I thought the whole point of the discussion in January 2004 (only slightly before my time :) was that these old Brilliant Prose articles did not become Featured Articles. Would it make sense, for example, to add them to the list of FFAs in a separate section? -- ALoan (Talk) 20:52, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I'm up to my eyeballs in templates and forget which page we're on :-) ArticleHistory discussions have occurred at the talk page of the template, and at Dr pda's page. But, I come back to the consistency issue - we do currently have a number of brilliant prose FAs which survived the RBP cut, so in order to be consistent, those that didn't make the cut, would be FFAs, no? When we FARC a brilliant prose promotion today, it gets added to the FFA list, so your proposal (for a separate list) would mean I'd have to go back through every FARC and see which were brilliant prose promotions. I think. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:08, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, was inspired to deal with refs on AEJ Collins. Anyway...

I'm not sure I follow. There were Brilliant Prose articles. When we moved to Featured Articles, some of the BP articles became FAs and some did not. It seems a bit odd to retrospectively decide that the ones that did not become FAs are Former FAs. BP and FA are not the same thing, really. I guess I am saying that the ones that did not make the cut are never-FAs. The ones that were BP articles and became FAs *are* FAs, so can legitimately be called FFAs if they are FARC'd.

When we FARC a FA that was a BP article, we add it to FFA, because it *was* a FA. No?

My head is now starting to hurt too... -- ALoan (Talk) 21:46, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

OK, so I don't know what to do now. Regrouping, I think the entire list of RBPs is given above, so we know how to un-do the work if needed. (But I'm not sure that's correct.) Where should we take this discussion for consensus - here? We're going to look awfully silly when we go back and remove all those templates :-) Best to stop working, and sit on this for a few days. On the other hand, if the list above is all of the RBPs, yes, I could probably move them to a separate section without much fuss - might be the best solution? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:50, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
By the way, to make your head hurt less (or more) ALoan, I didn't realize that RBPs had never been considered FAs - I thought "refreshing" meant they had been considered FAs, and were now being reconsidered. I've never understood brilliant prose promotions - are you saying all of those promoted came from this RBP list? I thought they had been previously promoted, and RBP was a re-evaluation, so when others began to add them, I thought it made complete sense. Clueless newbie - still not sure if I understand the historic process. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:58, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
BP functioned more or less like GA does now - essentially anyone could approve a page and it was considered BP. RBP occurred a few months after a formal nomination process was initiated. As I recall, the nomination process was initially still called BP, but I don't recall for sure if the "old" BP articles were considered "different" before the RBP. The theory here is that BP was the FA of the time, so those delisted from BP are equivalent to former FAs. (WP:FFA still lists two project pages that were considered BP at the time.) If the consensus goes another way, all that will be needed is to change the currentstatus to something other than FFA, say "reviewed". It would be easy to generate a category listing all pages with an RBP action. Gimmetrow 22:10, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Whew, Excedrin moment passed. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:14, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I am feeling a bit like a goldfish right now; but then I was not around in January 2004 (the name "featured" seems to appear here on 21 January 2004 but I think there was some discussion at around the same time). However as far as I am aware, BP articles were never considered "featured" and it would be misleading to describe them as such. There is a pretty clear divide between BP (pre-FA) and FA, and it is usually quite obvious which kind an article is. WP:WIAFA came pretty soon, in April 2004, having evolved from this, first added on 12 March 2004 by Jengod. (What it is that they say about people who forget their own history?) -- ALoan (Talk) 22:25, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Historical question - did we "feature" them on the main page pre-Jan 2004? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:32, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I had the idea to put featured articles on the main page in the first week of January, 2004. It got quite good reviews, so I implemented it about a week later. About 3 weeks after that, we switched the main page to the 4 pane look we have now. Raul654 20:48, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Note - here is the diff that started it all. Raul654 21:10, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Um, scrolling back the Main Page about 1,200 revisions gets to this on 1 January 2004. Aah, rather sweet, really. Anyway, a line for "featured articles" was added by Filiocht on 13 January, here, which was cycled manually, mostly by Raul654. Before then, there was nowhere for "featured articles" to be featured. By 23 February, it was looking something like the present Main Page - see. A pleasant walk down memory lane. -- ALoan (Talk) 23:00, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, this looks pretty definite - [3] - these are some of the very articles I just added as FFAs. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:45, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It does appear from this that most of the articles listed above were considered FAs before RBP happened. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:53, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Remember that pages may have been renamed, so just because it is part of the history of Featured Articles now, doesn't mean it was necessarily called Featured Articles then. However, for the record, Brilliant Prose Candidates was renamed 21 January 2004 to Featured Article Candidates, but there is history in Featured Article candidates going back to June 2003. As far as I recall, RBP was a refreshing of BP articles that had not been through the nomination process. (I was not involved with BP/FA back then.) As for featuring on the main page, the system as it is now began in late January 2004. Gimmetrow 23:02, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think the page name is confusing you: the page was moved from Wikipedia:Brilliant prose to Wikipedia:Featured articles on 21 January 2004. The give-away is the text which says "we couldn't possibly keep track of all of the brilliant prose. ... There is also a list of Brilliant pictures... If you wish to add a new page to this list, please nominate it first on Wikipedia:Brilliant prose candidates (see that page for further instructions)." and the edit history, which has this and then another couple of changes. Archaeology of Wikipedia, eh? -- ALoan (Talk) 23:00, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Back to the Excedrin then ! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:03, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It's not a big deal. It only involves those articles that were part of BP prior to June 2003 and were not kept as FA when the transition was made in January 2004. Articles that were nominated under the BP process after June 2003 were FA (as far as I recall), and those kept in RBP became FA too. Excluding those that became FA again after 2004, it involves perhaps 100 articles. The question is, what to do with them? I don't want to create a formerBP status just for these articles, so we either treat them as formerFA, former FAC, or nothing. Gimmetrow 23:16, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, my preferred answer would be the one that you have excluded (i.e. "former BP") but given that the old process for selecting BP articles was essentially that any person who felt like it just added them to the list, I would go for "nothing". I wonder whether it would be worth adding a "former BP" switch for the BP articles that became FAs... probably not worth the effort. -- ALoan (Talk) 23:20, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm just going to wait 'til you folks who've been around the block longer than I have decide, and I'll do whatever you tell me to do :-) Reversing the article additions from WP:FFA will be easy, as I took great care with my edit summaries; adjusting each talk page will be more time consuming, unless a new category is added, but at least I know exactly which articles to work on, per list above. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:04, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
My issue with a formerBP status is that it's obsolete. No new articles will get it. It would be equivalent to a failed FAC, and so eventually all formerBP would either become GA or FA, and the formerBP status would be gone entirely. (One might even argue that it is a lower status than a later failed FAC...) Personally I think of BP as the old FA, even though there was no way to really "feature" them. But an argument could be made that BP was not FA, and RBP was basically a mass FAC, so RBP failures are essentially failed FACs. So FFA or FFAC is fine with me. I'm mainly objecting to a new status (the line at the end of the table) because it would add yet more cases for the bot to handle. We could easily create a category for any article that has a BP or RBP action in the table, and keep those separate that way. Gimmetrow 05:04, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
So, can we agree to solve this entire problem by calling them FFAC (failed featured article candidates) - which would mean only one changed entry on the talk pages - and I remove them from WP:FFA? Would that satisfy everyone? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:23, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There are too many questions being asked at cross-purposes, so I'll try to sort them out. The Brilliant Prose articles were indeed quite similiar to the way GA is done now -- anybody could promote any articles he felt was OK. At some point in mid-2003, an optional review process (Brilliant Prose candidates) was created (I can't say exactly when with specificity because this was right about the time I started editing Wikipedia). The Brilliant Prose candidates page was eventually renamed to the FAC page, and the main Brilliant Prose page was renamed to the current featured articles (WP:FA) page. Given that there is a non-trivial distinction between how Brilliant Prose and Featured articles works, I think it makes sense to categorize them into two different categories, but I don't think it's a huge issue (mostly because I think the whole category system is evil, but that's a story for another day). If there are any more questions, I'd be happy to answer them. Raul654 21:01, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Fine. I've created Category:Wikipedia_former_brilliant_prose which includes any article with an AH template containing a RBP fail. Not sure how to force a category refresh in the WP database, but Sandy can use this for tracking. Otherwise, I guess we treat RBP fails as a former FAC. Gimmetrow 21:10, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm still confused - former FA or failed FAC? Is the conclusion that I change each ArticleHistory template on the failed RBPs to FFAC (failed FAC), and delete the articles from WP:FFA? We don't want them on the former featured article list? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:55, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
In the actions, they still have RBP. However, for currentstatus, I guess we're not going to treat them as formerFAs, but as former FACs, and so not list in WP:FFA unless you want to have a separate heading. See Talk:Paramount_Pictures. Gimmetrow 22:03, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OK, so I change the list above to FFAC, and they are now categorized in former brilliant prose. I'd rather not have to track them on this list, unless anyone wants me to. It makes our numbers look really high, like we're defeaturing more articles than we are. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:10, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, just look out for ones like Talk:Prostitution with later history. Someone should tell Placebo. Gimmetrow 22:18, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I told Placebo and Dr pda - reverted the additions, will change list above, and make sure list re-syncs. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:23, 3 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Two problems[edit]

Two out of sync, to track down:

These two were on the list before we started adding RBPs - need to find out if they had later FARCs, or if they should be deleted from WP:FFA. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:21, 3 February 2007 (UTC) I don't know what I'm supposed to do with these - there is conflicting evidence as to whether they survived RBP or not. Easiest thing would be for me to delete them from the list. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:13, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's difficult to tell from the RBP page what exactly happened with each vote, since no result is given. Perhaps OMG was supposed to be removed, but got overlooked? In any event, it was listed on FA and only removed months later through FAR. Seems like a FFA. As for HotUS, the FA-review page simply notes that it was removed by DanKeshet, the same editor who had removed it back in 2003 in the link above. The FA review page was created in 2005 probably to help people track things. Unless this can be found listed on an FA page in 2004 or later, I think this is a delisted BP, not a formerFA. Gimmetrow 00:53, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That's what I was thinking. So, I'll remove History of the United States from the FFA list, as it was a RBP, and I'll update the template at OMG to reflect the later FARC. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:56, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Gosh, you're fast, Gimmetrow ! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:59, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In sync. Next time the counter bot runs, WP:FFA should have 336 articles minus 12 repromoted minus 2 projects = 322. Category:Wikipedia former featured articles has 324 entries minus Wiki templates minus Elonka/work (left note) = 322.  Done SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:02, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) While I was hunting things down you seem to have solved the problem. I think I've managed to untangle what happened to History of the US. It was removed from Brilliant Prose on 28 Aug 2003 [8], and added to the 'Recently removed' section on WP:FAC. However this removal comment didn't have a timestamp, so lingered on until March 2004, when the 'Removals' part of WP:FAC was moved to FARC [9]. From there it found its way into the archives, and then in June 2005 the article was tagged with {{formerFA}}, and the FARC subpage created with the original (Aug 2003) removal rationale so that there wouldn't be a redlink in the template. For some reason it was voted on in Refreshing Brilliant Prose, despite not having been listed on BP for a few months prior to the vote (perhaps because it was in the Recent Removals section). It was only ever a BP, so shouldn't be on the list here, and arguably doesn't need the ArticleHistory template. --Dr pda 01:25, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Dr pda - but, uh, oh - I continued adding articlehistory templates on the rest of the RBP list above, listing them as FFACs - sounds like we need not continue doing that? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:07, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Repromotions[edit]

Is there a wikiproject or any sort of orginized effort around getting any of these re-promoted? Dalf | Talk 23:10, 1 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You might look at Marksell's WP:1FAPQ. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:45, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

FFA image[edit]

Anyone else bothered by the FFA image? To me, what is important about FFAs is not that they are not FA class but that they once were. The current crossed out FA seems to imply a substandard article rather than one which is simply no longer at current FA standards. I tried to make a FA star in the hazy distance casting a shadow towards the present, but my SVG skills are really not up to snuff. --Myke Cuthbert 15:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Former Featured Articles Wikiproject[edit]

According to Wikipedia:Former featured articles, there are over 400 articles that at one time met the Featured article criteria. Many of these were demoted for minor reasons that could easily be fixed by a dedicated group of editors. This project aims to dramatically increase the number of featured articles by first focusing on those former FAs closest to meeting the criteria, and working its way to those in need of more help. This would be done through scheduled collaborations on said articles. While all editors are welcome to join, editors with experience creating FAs, especially those with strong copyediting skills and/or knowledge of MoS are most needed. There is no reason for wikipedia to have any "former" FAs. It should be top priority to maintain them. "Once an FA, always an FA." is the eventual goal of this project. This project would also serve as a "rescue squad" for articles under FA review. Please click the above link and add your name in order to join. Wrad 14:14, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Nude celebrities[edit]

How should we handle this? Do we need to clutter the FFA page with a link to the AFD, will that add clarity or future problems? I'd like to hear from Gimmetrow as far as how the scripts work before adding anything.[10] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:11, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've thought of a problem (but Gimmetrow is the one "in the know"). I'm pretty sure that by deleting the article talk page, we're going to have a problem with script tallies on the number of FFAs and so on. Is it not possible on AFDs to leave the talk page, so that ArticleHistory is preserved? To whom should I direct this question? Need to hear from Gimmetrow on this, but I'd sure like to preserve the article talk page and articlehistory. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:54, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Saving the pieces here; since I'm not an admin, I don't have access to the deleted articlehistory:

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:03, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have restored and fully protected the talk page in question. If it turns out that it would not affect the tallies, I will re-delete it. I believe there should be some note on this page, perhaps a footnote; people might assume it's vandalism and remove it as I did today. Marskell 15:00, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Did the entire talk page history need to be restored for the Featured article bot to work? If not, it may meet the AfD results to redelete the talk page and then create a new talk page with one post. If you want to get rid of the red link at Wikipedia:Former_featured_articles#Culture_and_society, make Nude celebrities on the Internet a redirect, perhaps to Depictions of nudity or Celebrity sex tape. Where is the discussion making Nude celebrities on the Internet an FA article? I really would like to read that. -- Jreferee (Talk) 15:09, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Jreferee, I should be able to dig that up, but it will take some time. In the "olden days", articles moved directly from WP:FAC to WP:FA without interim FAC files, and we recreated those fake files to build articlehistory. To find the info you want, I have to step through the old WP:FAC page literally diff by diff until I find it. When I do, I'll link it in to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Nude celebrities on the Internet. On the other issues, Gimmetrow is really the one who knows what is needed for the scripts and bots. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:41, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Here's the only thing I came up with: [11]. Back then, I think anyone could just add them. Someone should ask Mav :-) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:00, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Making Nude celebrities on the Internet a redirect to celebrity sex tape could work.-h i s s p a c e r e s e a r c h 15:43, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not on board with the redirect idea, as that doesn't solve the articlehistory issue, and I'm not concerned about the red link in FFA. But again, Gimmetrow is the person who knows the issues. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:49, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Marskell, since the talk page is fully protected and I'm not an admin, can you please add this to the articlehistory template: 


| action3       = AFD
| action3date   = 04:18, 31 August 2007 
| action3link   = Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nude celebrities on the Internet
| action3result = deleted
| action3oldid  = do you have access to the last oldid as an admin?

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:49, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, you can just leave off the oldid line, since it goes nowhere anyway. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:54, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Added. Jre, there was no discussion on it, I believe. Someone deemed it "Brilliant prose" in 2003, it was officially made FA in early 2004, and then demoted a few months later. The redirect won't work because people may link through from here and assume they're looking at a page that was once an FA. And while I can imagine someone searching "Nude celebrities", "Nude celebrities on the Internet" is unlikely. I will bury a note beside. Marskell 16:10, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Including info from Sandy above, Mav posted a summary 'Do we really want to needlessly link to smut?'23:00, 24 February 2002. Two minutes later, in a 23:52, 24 February 2002 post to Wikipedia:Featured Articles, Mav wrote "Added Nude celebrities on the Internet; Don't laugh, it really is a well written and researched article." Lord Emsworth went around tagging talk pages with an FA note in February 2004 21:53, 15 February 2004, probably part of identifying FA articles via their talk page. So far, I'm not seeing an initial consensus. -- Jreferee (Talk) 16:31, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You mean no consensus to first make it an FA? No, but in a sense that's true of many pre-'04 because it was often a one editor decision. The nomination system was, I think, introduced in the last quarter of '03. See Wikipedia:Archive/Refreshing brilliant prose - Others, where the article ought to have been "refreshed" to make it an official FA; it appears it didn't have the votes, even then. Oh well. Marskell 16:44, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, end of the second quarter. "Beginning mid-June of 2003, a nomination process for Brilliant prose was implemented. Before this process existed, articles were added to Brilliant prose by individuals, and no system of debate, voting, or discussion took place" -- Wikipedia:Archive/Refreshing brilliant prose. Marskell 16:48, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
According to the work Gimmetrow and I did when we built articlehistories, Nude isn't unique in this sense (little consensus to retain as FA in RBP). There was a lot of informality then; some of those articles have yet to come through FAR. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:50, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

One script works off the links on WP:FFA, but there are already two links on the page (the project pages) that don't have ArticleHistory on the talk page. If WP:FFA contains a link without any corresponding talk page, the script would need to check if the talk page existed, which would slow it down some, but I think that's the only consequence. Still, I wouldn't leave a redlink with the other links. I would make a separate section on the page, listing "former featured articles that have been deleted", without wikilinks. Why bother with a link, there's nothing there anyway? And if there is no wikilink to a non-existent page, I won't have to change the script, so it seems like a win-win to me. Gimmetrow 18:02, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If we set that up, how would it affect the tally at the top (include or no?) and how does it relate for example to the WikiProject pages and Provinces of Thailand, which are still counted? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:43, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Do whatever you want, it doesn't matter much. My script is off by two because of the project pages anyway. If this one is treated as an FFA but isn't linked, I think the script would be off by one then. Gimmetrow 20:33, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OK, it sounds like I can pass the buck to Marskell and let him decide how where he wants it to display and whether to preserve the talk page  :-) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:57, 1 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As stated above, the early BP process was to simply have individuals add articles they liked - for whatever reason - to the BP page. I like the solution suggested above ; have a section that lists unlinked FFAs that have been deleted. If this article ever gets recreated, then we can restore the history and list as normal. --mav 14:58, 2 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A historical note; back in early 2002 the English Wikipedia only had about 20,000 articles. Of those, this was probably one of the best 500 or so articles. Times and standards have certainly changed since then. --mav 16:14, 2 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There ya go--can't argue with a guy who was here in '02. These detective stories are interesting but sort of a waste of time. I actually think we should leave it as it is with no separate section. (It seems very possible to me that that this will never happen again.) By having s separate section, just for one, it invites people to keep asking us about that one. The redlink may lead people to think vandalism, but I've left a little note saying that it's not. Similarly, I think we should leave the talk page restored--it'll save some other cohort of editors scratching their heads in five years. It does violate WP:CSD, but it's an exceptional case and IAR (that otherwise troublesome principle) is made for something like this. Marskell 19:33, 3 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That's fine with me; maybe somebody will create an actual article at that title some day. --mav 02:07, 5 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Mav, the article is already restored (so Marskell did the right thing in just leaving the link alone). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:09, 5 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Articles that may never have been featured to begin with.[edit]

A pretty minor note, but some of the articles on this list seem to have their former featured status be rather dubious. I'm not referring to brilliant prose promotions that survived the refreshing vote and were later demoted, but rather ones that seemingly did not, yet were not taken off the list for some reason. A clerical error, if that's what it was, does not seem to merit granting something Featured status, even if it was later removed? I'm not familiar with the history here, so it's entirely possible I'm missing something.

Specifically, both pub quiz and paradox (seemingly) lost their refreshing votes (1-2 and 1-4), but apparently weren't removed immediately for some reason. Political correctness has a quite wonky history with one person re-promoting unilaterally, apparently, but that didn't go contested for a time, so eh. I'm sure that there are probably others, too. Is there a reason behind this, or perhaps should some of these be removed from this list? SnowFire 06:18, 5 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Raul has been pretty clear on this; in spite of the chaotic history of the FA page prior to 2004, if an article legitimately appeared on WP:FA according to the procedure at the time (that is, anyone could promote, and excluding vandalism), it was a featured article. Our histories reflect that. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:27, 5 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I thought they were improvements[edit]

Thank you, SandyGeorgia, for your helpful and flattering characterization of my motives ("rvv"). --RobertG ♬ talk 09:12, 7 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry, RobertG; that was completely unintended, I don't know how I did that, but I didn't even see it until you pointed it out now (and it's still hard for me to see the two Vs together, that's my eyesight). I have all kinds of issues with the touchpad on my new laptop, which I hate, but I can't say that's what caused the error, because I didn't realize I'd made it until now. I will create a null edit to correct the record.[12] Also, I left Gimmetrow a note right after that edit, asking him if he could reconstruct what you wanted to do in a way that didn't affect the bot (footnotes in the list);[13] I hope that's enough to convince you I didn't intend to call it vandalism, and my sincerest apologies. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:12, 7 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Completely missed the note on my talk page. Is this resolved? Gimmetrow 18:17, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Resolve in the sense of ruffled feelings, yes, but I still don't know if the footnotes he introduced interfere with the bot functions. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:21, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The bot gets links off the page. If the note doesn't include links to articles that shouldn't be on the page, I don't think it's a problem. Gimmetrow 18:24, 17 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FFA -> which class[edit]

If a FA is delisted, i have always thought it goes to the highest possible rating for which it has been reviewed. This means that if no GA or A class review was ever done, it goes to B. Have i gotten this wrong?

While assessing for the Novels project, i rated an FFA as B, which had been set to A for ALL projects after delisting. See Talk:A Tale of a Tub. I was reverted with a claim that it had been rated as FA. This isn't in the history, nor are any GA or A class reviews. I see from the FAR that many reviewers seemed to be worried about what the main editor there might think - does he have some secret admin power to review his own articles?

If i am wrong, please let me know, as i do much of the assessment for the LGBT and SF projects too, and if not, can someone with FAC experience chime in on the articles talk page? Thanks!Yobmod (talk) 10:28, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(Seems a wiki-tantrum has resulted in all the ratings and project banners being removed, which i guess solves the problem, but they'll probably come backYobmod (talk) 10:42, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

"Official" and "proper formal" reviews? Rules?! To work out whether that article is well organized and essentially complete, of a length suitable for the subject, appropriately structured, and referenced, well illustrated, and very useful? Did someone use the wrong colour ink on the paperwork?
The last person to remove the project templates was you "Wiki-tantrum", hmm? And you yourself are currently bemoaning "needless bureaucracy" on your talk page! -- Testing times (talk) 11:12, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
what's your point? Yes they are rules, the same rules that stop me adding FA to random pokemon articles. The assessments show that independant editors have assessed it against the criteria. If there were no rules for the ratings, they would be completely meaningless, and everyone could claim their articles were super-FA-better-than-sex-class. Are you interesting in finding out what the policy is, or just wiki-stalking me? I complained about the Film projects checklist, then filled it in, as requested. IT's there banner, so they make the rules.Yobmod (talk) 11:18, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Tale of a Tub is "super-FA-better-than-sex-class", IMHO, but "A" will suffice. Is is certainly not "B". If we cannot agree, perhaps a better approach would be to leave off the assessments entirely.
But wiki-stalking you? By following the link to your talk page which appears at the end of nearly every reply you have made at Talk:A Tale of a Tub, and reading your concurrent discussion there with User:Girolamo Savonarola about needless bureaucracy in relation to B-class ratings? (A delicious irony, I thought.) Or perhaps by following the link to this page which you yourself added at Talk:A Tale of a Tub? (I note in passing that you have also "stalked" me (by your definition) to my talk page. I don't mind at all, incidentally, although it may make sense to have this discussion in one place rather than four.)
If you are going to accuse me of "stalking you" to your talk page (and presumably here) then I can't see much point in talking to you any further. -- Testing times (talk) 11:33, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Going to my talk page, and presenting random facts about me that have nothing to do with my question here. As you are not addressing my question at all, why are you here? This section is to find out if FA should go to A class automatically, not whether we should abandon all rules of wiki ratings. If consensus says yes, then fine. Or maybe the rules need changing so that they do, or FAR recommends a final rating. Currently the article in question needs many more citation to be A class - i suspect it would fail GA without more inline citations.Yobmod (talk) 11:48, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
A class requires formal review by a wikiproject (see A-class criteria). GA requires WP:GAN. Individual reviewers can only rate articles up to B-class. A-class requires a consensus and can not be granted by a single reviewer. WP:IAR has nothing to do with this. Ruslik (talk) 12:17, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, Yobmod, you have that incorrect. Before C-class was added, GimmeBot automatically downgraded defeatured articles to B-class. Most defeatured articles are no longer GA class, and would need to be resubmitted to GAN. Once C-class was added, the decision was made that the FAR process (and GimmeBot) would no longer be automatically assigning B-class to defeatured articles, because the distinction between the classes had become finer and re-assessments should be done by Projects. When an article is defeatured, GimmeBot removes the assessments. Editors can re-apply to GAN, and Projects can reassess the class, but I have never seen a defeatured FA that would make GA, much less A-class. Please do not blank the articlehistory; it is the record of, well, the articlehistory and it is kept on all FAs and FFAs. Project assessments (A, B, C) are left blank until the Projects re-assess, and an article can't be reassigned GA without going through GAN. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:34, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, so they should go to blank then, thanks! btw I didn't remove the article history, i reverted the readdition of the project banners with A class - someone before had removed everything. My rating it as B was from my assessment, so leaving blank or B is what i was aiming for.Yobmod (talk) 07:40, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think it would be fine if GimmeBot (talk · contribs) reassessed defeatured articles to C-class, that would probably be an appropriate preliminary step, and then the WikiProjects could go from there - or alternatively re-nom for WP:GAC consideration at that point in time. Cirt (talk) 21:43, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
GimmeBot doesn't assess. Before there was a C-class, assigning B-class was straightforward and the only real option open. Now that there is a choice, it's not up to Gimmetrow, GimmeBot, or any bot to be assessing articles; articles which are defeatured have the assessment field left blank so the Projects can reassess. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:28, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
While I completely understand that rationale, I think that C-class would be an appropriate default, and the projects could go from there. If the bot was not actively "assessing" when it defaulted to B-class, neither would it be for C-class either. Cirt (talk) 23:40, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The bot wasn't assessing before: there was no other choice. A GA rating requires a GAN process, an A-rating depends on the WikiProject, and defeatured articles most assuredly are not start class, so B-class before was the only option. Since it is no longer the only option, it is not an issue that GimmeBot should have to deal with. Projects assign assessments, re-assessing is not part of FAR. I restored the articlehistory on that article and left the assessments blank; it's up to someone else to decide what assessments are, not FAR or GimmeBot. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:01, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, that is incorrect. That was not the only choice before - the bot could have rated the article B-class, or removed the ratings, leaving them blank. So defaulting to B-class in the past was not the only option at that point in time. Cirt (talk) 01:04, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Clever. Conclusion is the same; it's not FAR's job or GimmeBot's job to re-assess when there are now multiple choices, so assessments are left blank now. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:11, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well in any event, they should have probably been left blank before, in that case, and not defaulted to B-class. Cirt (talk) 01:13, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If you feel that strongly that de-featured articles are automatically C-class, then feel free to go over to Talk:A Tale of a Tub and tell Geogre that you think it's a C-class article, but please don't put the burden of assessments on to FAR or Gimmetrow. Each Project has different assessment standards and procedures, some have none, I left the field blank, Project assessments are done by someone else. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:26, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Right, I think the current way it is being done now is okay - not necessarily the best option, but it is certainly appropriate to blank out the ratings after an article has been defeatured. Cirt (talk) 01:44, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
But, erm, SandyGeorgia readded the project banners, and they say A class again. I guess i should just give up and let them have the fake class? I cannot talk to the editors there, i'll get told to shut up, or IAR. I reverted to blank assessed, and unwatched the page - it's not longer covered by the novels project, so is not dishonestly claiming any assessment from any project i work on, just the other 2.Yobmod (talk) 07:43, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I left the assessments blank; whatever is done with assessments is not part of this page (WP:FFA); A, B and C-class assessments are unrelated to the FA process. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:36, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

no likey[edit]

I don't like the former featured article star having a cross. I want it to be broken in half. --Fangoriously (talk) 02:27, 23 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

[edit]

Pastun people. Adding a note at the bottom about that YellowMonkey (bananabucket) 01:39, 7 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

links to featured versions?[edit]

where can last featured versions be found? 93.86.205.97 (talk) 14:14, 2 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Look at the Article history milestones on the article talk page; a link is provided with the date. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:17, 2 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
thanks. i wish those links were more obviously presented without a need to click on the box expansion link... 93.86.205.97 (talk) 16:09, 2 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Article count (2)[edit]

There is a count of 1,287 but only 1,285 blue links on the page. Tropical Storm Franklin (2005) and Hurricane Philippe (2005) are not linked on the page, but adding them would adjust the page so that the count matched the number of blue links. Am I missing something? @WP:FAR coordinators: SandyGeorgia DrKay (talk) 17:29, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

looking now, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:49, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I think there are other problems.
So, I think that the 1,285 is correct, and the error comes from the FARs added to articlehistory, which don't belong there. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:57, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I removed the FAR listings from article milestones on those two article talk pages; does that correct the tallies? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:00, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]
No, it's out by 1. I may look at this again, but after a break. DrKay (talk) 18:13, 12 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

DrKay this edit by The great Jay was probably part of the problem. Jay, please leave this page editing to the Coords. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:14, 13 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Alright. I will keep it to you guys. Blue Jay (talk) 12:27, 13 April 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Deleted FAs?[edit]

Is there any list anywhere of FAs that have actually been deleted? FOARP (talk) 16:53, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

There are five items on this page that are notated as now being redirects. Nikkimaria (talk) 17:05, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I see six (?) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:16, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Ah - five "now a redirect", one just redirect". Nikkimaria (talk) 17:46, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Should we standardize and double-check that we got them all? I don't know if I missed any during my periods of wikibreak, and I wonder if DrKay has an automated means of making sure we have them all. I also used to make sure we flagged (at FAC, in red) any nominations that might be re-promoted at FAC, so that Coords could alter this page, but I've noticed that the current @WP:FAC coordinators: no longer do that (eg, recent re-promotion of Space Shuttle Challenger disaster [14]) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:16, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
PS, I left the “now a” off of Doug Ring with the Australian cricket team in England in 1948 because it has yet to be merged and redirected, although we are quite a bit past the AFD. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:39, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I thought about starting one when spoo (food) was deleted, but undeleting the history under a redirect seemed better. —Kusma (talk) 18:39, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks guys Folks FOARP (talk) 18:52, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Not all guys in here :) Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:37, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@FOARP: - Not sure the best way to check for all, but I have a link classifier script installed that flags which links are redirects, so ones that are no longer separate articles but not marked as such are Harold and Inge Marcus Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, National parks of England and Wales (I think), Aryan Invasion Theory (history and controversies), Patriot Act, Title III, Subtitle A (I think), [[]], 2012 tour of She Has a Name, and Torchic. While we're at it, I think the redirect link for Metal Gear Solid isn't right (article it points to was never a FA, we maybe want Metal Gear Solid (1998 video game) instead but I'm not entirely sure), and Doug Ring with the Australian cricket team in England in 1948 still hasn't been merged, although that was the consensus of the AFD and FAR, and it's marked as a redirect on the former featured articles page. Hog Farm Talk 19:47, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

So the answer to Sandy's question is yes, we should standardize annotations for these. Automating it makes the most sense to me if it's possible because of an order of operations problem: if an article is delisted because it's merged/deleted/redirected then we can mark it manually, but if that happens after delisting chances are coords will not be aware. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:17, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Hog Farm, Cwmhiraeth, and Steel1943: I have corrected all of the others below (Harold and Inge in progress still), but the situation at Metal Gear Solid and Metal Gear Solid (1998 video game) is an unfortunate mess that may not be worth the time to fix. I am, nonetheless, noting the problem and pinging here for educational purposes only. The original FA was, in fact, at Metal Gear Solid, now redirected to Metal Gear, with the FFA at Metal Gear Solid (1998 video game), and now no record on article talk of Metal Gear Solid having ever been an FA. But the talk page of Metal Gear Solid (1998 video game) is noted as an FFA. The two redirects make for work in reconstructing the history.
Metal Gear Solid was demoted in 2008. Cwmhiraeth (correctly) moved the article in 2019—no problem there. The problems happened with Steel1943's edits right after Cwmhiraeth's in 2019.
Articlehistory is designed and intended to require no updates if an article moves; the links will not break and do not need to be changed. If/when they are changed, this wreaks havoc in archives, of the type we have to then sort with Mike Christie for his FA stats. (See the considerable work involved at User talk:SandyGeorgia/archFASorting. In this case, the links were also corrected in the FAC archives,[15] [16] but this work should not have been necessary, and similar moves make a mess for Mike and me to sort.) This article was originally featured and then defeatured as "Metal Gear Solid", and leaving those links to accurately reflect what the article name was at the time is how articlehistory is intended to work. Instead, Steel1943 unnecessarily moved both the FAC and the FAR to the new name, and updated the article milestones (and archives) to reflect that (samples: here and here). In effect, these moves make the history difficult to track. And Steel1943, having done this, missed the step to also change the name at WP:FFA.
Moral of the story: 1) educate others about how to use articlehistory to avoid the need for all this checking, 2) advise editors not familiar with articlehistory or FAC and FAR archives to consult someone who is before moving FACs or FARs, and e) the FFA article still exists (has not been deleted or merged away, just changed names), so we don't need to indicate it here as now a redirect. The article that was once an FA is still in existence, just after a move and two redirects. Rather than undo all of those moves, I will change the article name at FFA.[17] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:53, 26 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at the list I turned up:
So what appears to have happened is that aside from maybe the Meteorological history one, there wouldn't have been any reason for the coords to have known about the merges. This'll just be something that needs checked every so often. Hog Farm Talk 20:53, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I am unable to work on these corrections at the moment, as I am up to my eyeballs in a fringe-y popular controversy at PANDAS that is getting lots of attention; please let me know if no one else is able to get to this, and I will put it on my list. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:57, 25 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
OK, caught up at PANDAS now, so I can work on this list tomorrow. Also, since no one has merged the Doug Ring article, I will just redirect and let them sort it out later, so we can finish that one, too. And I’ll look at Metal Gear. Mañana. Thanks for doing the hard work, HF ! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 09:03, 26 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Just got a big history refresher on this page at #Consolidating category and list; did not realize that history with Gimme, DrPda, Aloan (WOW) and Raul was stored on this page. Back to sleep I go, if the pooch is done with her business. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 09:49, 26 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Update[edit]

Update: So, I have noted six more redirects,[18] bringing us to a total of 12 (which includes the unfinished Doug Ring, but does not yet include the unfinished Harold and Inge Marcus). The Metal Gear situation is a different mess which I will separately explain next.[19] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:20, 26 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I have now corrected Talk:Harold and Inge Marcus Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering [20] to reflect the 2016 merge and defeature. I used the dates and oldids as the 2016 dates when this occurred, even though the procedural FAR was today. I think posterity will find it all explained by clicking on the FAR link.

But we may (or may not) have one remaining problem, which the @WP:FAR coordinators: and Mike Christie may want to contemplate. Because of the unusual way we had to do this, the FAR is not listed in FAR archives. Does that matter? I can't see that it does unless somewhere down the road someone tries to make some numbers match, and they won't. If we wanted to add it to archives, would we add it to this month, or go back to 2016? And if we did that, we'd have to adjust the FAR numbers as well as WP:FAS. My recommendation is to just leave it alone, but there may be problems with that that I am not foreseeing. And, if we add it to archives this month, FAS won't work, as Bencherlite already removed that article from FA. Presumably.

But if Bencherlite did remove it from WP:FA in 2016, why did the tallies at WP:FFA not show an error, since there is no FAR in archives ? <grrr ... > one more thing to investigate. Hog Farm I am most appreciative that a FAC Coord is following this, as you can see how the messes ripple through the process. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:38, 26 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Ah ha! I see we had already discovered and footnoted the Harold and Inge discrepancy at WP:FAS; mystery solved. (I seem to recall DrKay finding this earlier.) So, that means if we want to go back and add that to 2016 archives, the FAS tables could be easily adjusted. My recommendation now is that we do add it to the August 2016 FAR archive, adjust all tallies, and correct the footnote at WP:FAS to indicate now fixed. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:11, 26 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@DrKay and Hawkeye7:, sorry for being such a pest, but you will need to check my work here (something is off).

  1. First, I added the procedural FAR to August (rather than September), as that is where it was already noted at WP:FAS. [21] Perhaps that is when it was actually deleted at WP:FA.
  2. Next, I manually closed the FAR with FAtop and FAbottom, [22] but I missed something, as the FAR has no edit button at Wikipedia:Featured article review/archive/August 2016 (probably something I got wrong re noinclude or something?)
  3. Last, I update the tallies at WP:FAS, [23] but noticed that there was another error in the chart (the delisteds were noted as 11 when they were 12, now 13, but the new difference of 214 (added minus deleted) matches the total FAs, so the overall numbers seem correct now.

So, I think I got everything except I don't know why the edit button doesn't show on the FAR in archives. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:24, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Looks normal to me. DrKay (talk) 21:27, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, I see the issue now ... there is no Review comments and FARC comments section headings, but the edit button is next to the actual article title. D'oh. Sorry :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:32, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Also @AmericanLemming: who also tracks WP:FAS and will want to know what the heck I'm doing :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:26, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Query[edit]

Since ANAK Society may be headed for a delete (rather than redirect), does anyone object to changing the note to "Deleted or redirected" so that we have one standard note? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:43, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Sure. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:56, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
OK, first I am adjust the archives and FAS to account for Harold the Engineer (above). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:57, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]
 Done [24] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:30, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

So, now a ctrl-f on deleted returns the number of "deleted or redirected" FFAs, which as of now is 13. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:34, 27 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Update now to 14: [25] (And noting again here for posterity that Ealdgyth began source reviews at FAC the month after I promoted Anak Society.) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:31, 4 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Super Mario 64[edit]

@Coolperson177, DrKay, and Nikkimaria: Talk:Super Mario 64 has now been (re-)promoted for the third time. I have completely forgotten if: a) that means we remove it from the top of the list and b) if we increment a counter. It's now listed at both the top (delisted) and the bottom (repromoted), along with other articles that have been repromoted more than once. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:36, 27 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Current FAs that were once FFAs are listed once in the re-promoted section. Current FFAs that were previously re-promoted are listed twice. There is one counter for all articles that have ever been demoted and one counter for articles that have ever been repromoted, so in this case no adjustment is necessary to the counters. DrKay (talk) 15:50, 27 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, DrKay (not that I am likely to remember next time, but I'll know where to look for the answer now :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:53, 27 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) I don't know how it works, since this was my first involvement in the FA process. DrKay's logic makes sense though. — Coolperson177 (t|c) 15:54, 27 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
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