Template talk:Current/archive1

Old/unsorted Discussion

Is this really useful? For major events Wikipedia is one of the most consistently up to date sources on the Internet, so why should we mark our information as possibly being out of date while news organizations do not? The time the article was last updated is clearly displayed no more should be needed.

Also little thinking seems to have gone into what should be marked as a current or ongoing event. Random people have been tagged. Should all athletes like Eric Gagné or José Mourinho be marked? Should all politicians? Should every living person?

What about politics? The U.S. presidential election, 2004 is marked, but George W. Bush is not. The Alliance of the Democratic Left is marked, but no other political parties. Should they all political parties be marked as being possibly out of date? - SimonP 03:30, Jun 21, 2004 (UTC)

It's currently being used on 2004 Atlantic hurricane season where being a few hours out of date can potentially be significant. -- Cyrius|✎ 17:51, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I think general policy is that event articles, like specific hurricanes, or specific articles on US elections get marked, while we don't generally tag fields of science, people etc. [[User:Sverdrup|❝Sverdrup❞]] 01:22, 15 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Please, people, the templates are no place for political garbage.

Concur. Vandalizing won't get you any votes, but will only get you banned. – Kaihsu 21:11, 2004 Nov 2 (UTC)

I've protected it temporarily - I suggest that we keep protection in place until after the election. There really is no good reason that I can think of for non-sysops to be editing this template in the meantime. -- ChrisO 21:37, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Congrats

Congratulations to the illuminated ones for using the Message box Template, which I created, and was much criticized in its time. --Cantus…☎ 01:12, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

Category name

Shouldn't that be Category:Current events, in line with most categories having names in the plural? -- Paddu 14:52, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Yup. I think I'll fix it now. JOHN COLLISON (An Liúdramán) 11:17, 29 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Proposal: Add link to history

How about adding a link to the history page? This would be a useful reminder to assess the credibility of statements by checking how recently they have been added and if there is an edit war going on. Sebastian 07:05, 2005 Mar 16 (UTC)

Background Color

The background color looks sickly pale right now - maybe light gray? Light blue?-Grick 05:43, Mar 24, 2005 (UTC)

Wording

I've often seen people remove this template from articles about people or places on the grounds that they are not "events" and cannot be said to be "ongoing". I've changed the wording slightly so as to make it possible to use this template on such pages without it looking strange. — Trilobite (Talk) 21:33, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Removal of unnecessary tags

I've started to remove this template from articles that do not require them. Since tags clutter the top of the page and are more useful to editors than readers, they should only be used when necessary. As explained above, this tag is appropriate for "current event articles that will likely experience numerous edits in a short period of time". Examples of articles where this template should be used (as of 7 Apr 2005): Pope John Paul II, Papal conclave, 2005 and UK general election, 2005. Carbonite | Talk 03:41, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Template:flux

Shouldn't {{flux}} be merged somehow with this one? I think they're redundant. — mark ✎ 22:13, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

(That was a crosspost from Template talk:Flux, everyone please join the discussion there...) — mark ✎ 22:18, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

text on 2 lines

I'm just providing a history of my edits here for discussion. I originally put a new line, and later made some style changes which I wasn't able to do within the bounds of the {{message box}} meta-template (CSS padding, for example). I think having the text wrapped and on two lines looks far more preferable than having it on one long line. What do others think? Talrias (t | e | c) 21:04, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I think that the small text is just too much. Even with the wider width the last word breaks to the next line.--MarSch 30 June 2005 12:00 (UTC)

I think we should just drop that part about bias and vandalism. It makes it seem like a biger problem than it really is. Bias and vandalism hapens from time to time on many other pages without us needing to excuse ourself for it to the reader. Shanes 30 June 2005 12:11 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree. It was originally added as {{flux}} was merged into this template, but I don't think the text really adds anything useful. Talrias (t | e | c) 30 June 2005 13:27 (UTC)

How about: "This article is about a current event. Information may be rapidly outdated." It would fit on one line --MarSch 30 June 2005 14:17 (UTC)

That is removing the "or section" text, however, and this template is used in specific sections of some articles. Talrias (t | e | c) 30 June 2005 14:29 (UTC)

How about: "This article/section is about a current event. Information may be rapidly outdated." It would fit on one line --MarSch 30 June 2005 14:40 (UTC)

Even shorter than yours: "This article discusses a current event. The information may be outdated." (and have it always at the top of the article). Talrias (t | e | c) 30 June 2005 14:52 (UTC)

That is fine by me also. Very crisp. I'll implement it --MarSch 30 June 2005 15:18 (UTC)

Wording

I don't like "Information may be rapidly outdated." We should change it to something like "This article is a current event. Information may change quickly." That sounds much better I think and doesn't give off the impression that editors aren't working hard to stay as up-to-date as possible. This one is much better I believe, "Information may change quickly." Cookiecaper 3 July 2005 00:57 (UTC)

Works for me. --MarSch 3 July 2005 11:34 (UTC)

I prefer the previous version because it flows better, and I think that your fear of giving the wrong impression is quite unfounded, though it's such a minor point that in any case it can safely be ignored. The purpose of this template is to make excuses for an outdated article, so it's perfectly okay to sound as though we're doing that. — Dan | Talk 3 July 2005 14:19 (UTC)

I agree with cookiecaper. It shouldn't say that information on the page may be "outdated". Since there are always people working on Wikipedia (and especially on current events), it should say that information could change rapidly. It's rare that pages are "outdated" since editors often focus on articles that deal with current events. For a comprimise, you can put both statements. — joturner 6 July 2005 02:18 UTC

Why the constant re-wording?

My opinion on this template is that the current version (the one by Cantus) is fine. I edited this page yesterday (my IP address changes often; sorry about not discussing it first), and I stated that the previous version was too simple. I agree with Joturner in a sense. Information in these articles do change rapidly, as the event progresses. A suggestion is to make the text smaller. --65.54.98.107 6 July 2005 22:35 (UTC)

Stop changing the template

I don't get why you don't like my version. It is important to say that there will be bias & vandalism in the article to let readers know. Why are you all taking out important information?? You DO need all that stuff!! --Hottentot

Please read the above discussion on this very subject. Your opinion is clearly contrary to consensus. If you still feel the need to express your opinion, do so here, and do not edit the template until and unless consensus favors your version. Incidentally, you're likely to get more support if you provide cogent reasons to support your opinion, in addition to vague assertions and exclamation marks. — Dan | Talk 7 July 2005 01:19 (UTC)

The "consensus" above just appears to be a conversation between only two people. --Hottentot

On behalf of all the people who don't really care what the specifics of the template are: please stop fucking with the template. It's annoying to have it changing a lot. Thank you. -- Cyrius|✎ 7 July 2005 03:06 (UTC)

Why don't you tell that to all the other people have been reverting it back? --Hottentot

This seems like a rather trivial arguement here. Hottentot, I haven't actually seen anyone revert back to your version of the current event template. However, given that you believe it is so important (and that there probably is a place where someone has reverted to your version), I'll offer my two-cents.

The comment about bias and vandalism is unnecessary. All pages are susceptible to vandalism and bias. In fact, a current event is probably less likely to contain vandalism. Why? For the same reason current event pages often aren't outdated. Editors give extra attention to articles that involve current events, so they can be quick to update them. With all those extra editors paying attention to current event pages, bias and vandalism are usually quickly spotted and eliminated. On the other hand, with some old forgotten page like Jamuqa, which hasn't been updated in a month, vandals can get away with their pranks very easily. -- [User:Joturner|joturner]] 7 July 2005 03:48 (UTC)

That may be true, but don't you remember what it was like on the Michael Jackson articles right after the verdict was told on TV? It was almost impossible to edit the articles because so many people were clicking the edit button and there was a lot more vandalism than most articles at that moment, because it was a Current Event. --Hottentot

That depends very much on the current event. Take a look at all the articles who currently use it. Most of them aren't plagued by vandalism at all, and those who are have it fixed swiftly. We don't need to excuse our self for any sporadic vandalism here as we don't need to excuse it on many other pages that are much more often vandalised. And, btw, please mind the WP:3RR. Shanes 7 July 2005 04:43 (UTC)

Would the following be any better?

I tried to compromise by removing the vandalism and bias part. Although some people may think this is important, the wording is slightly more simple. 63.21.164.248 7 July 2005 11:19 (UTC)

Yeah, basically the one you had except the secon line not being in small font. That's what my latest edit looks like. --Hottentot

Though it's still on two lines, which is more than I believe is necessary, the present state of the template is better than the larger version. I trimmed it a tiny bit further and shrunk the image by 10px. — Dan | Talk 7 July 2005 20:57 (UTC)

Shift more traffic to Wikinews

It seems to me that many of the articles that use this template are in fact news articles, and not encyclopedia entires. Therefore, most of the editing to keep the article bang up to date with the kind of information that is useful while the event is occuring, but redundant in the days, weeks or years that follow, should be done on the Wikinews article. Wikipedia articles should all be well-thought-out and carefully checked. If nothing else, there is a duplication of effort between Wikinews and Wikipedia and both articles on the London bombings are looking somewhat similar.

Therefore, can this template be expanded to include a link to the appropriate Wikinews article, that would be introduced with "Latest information can be found on Wikinews"? — PhilHibbs | talk

Note that I don't think this is a very good implementation, I don't like the wording, but is just a starting point for discussion. — PhilHibbs | talk 7 July 2005 18:04 (UTC)

Well, there are many current event articles that aren't covered on wikinews. What about them? Maybe a new template for the cases where it is current and covered in both, but as we do have and use the template:wikinews (as in the 7 July 2005 London bombings article) I don't really see the need. Shanes 7 July 2005 18:21 (UTC)

It's a case of what each wiki is for. WikiNews is for current events, reported in a news style. Wikipedia is for encyclopedia-style information. If there's a Wikipedia article that is about a current event, written in the style of a news article, then it should be on WikiNews instead. The template:wikinews is fine for linking to news articles that are not about current events, I think linking to the news article while the event is occurring needs different text. — PhilHibbs | talk 8 July 2005 09:59 (UTC)

ID/CSS tags

I'd just thought I would point out that Netoholic's inclusion of an ID tag and modification of the classes does not work from a technical point of view, as it makes the template left-aligned. I'm not sure what the point of his edits really are here, but this template's been center-aligned since it was created. Talrias (t | e | c) 8 July 2005 17:34 (UTC)

Dude, the part that read "text-align: left;" is what made the text left-aligned, not the CSS tags. I also see no discussion anywhere on this page about centering the text. I really don't care either way, but don't make any demands that it be centered, or not. -- Netoholic @ 8 July 2005 17:36 (UTC)

I said the template was left aligned, i.e. the entire box. Before your edits (which you have still not explained the point of), the box was center-aligned. Your modification of the tags has moved it to the left. I'm not talking about the text here. Talrias (t | e | c) 8 July 2005 17:39 (UTC)

It is absolutely centered in my browser. What skin setting do you use? What browser? My edit put in CSS formatting that is very standard and used across almost all article notice templates. For comparison are this version and Template:Cleanup centered when you view them? -- Netoholic @ 8 July 2005 17:43 (UTC)

Current isn't, cleanup is. I am using Monobook with no personal modifications, with Firefox. Talrias (t | e | c) 8 July 2005 17:47 (UTC)

Same here. The problem is clearly[may be] with "notice noprint" class. The align tag seems to be ignored in Firefox when the CSS says differently.DoubleBlue (Talk) 8 July 2005 18:36 (UTC)[edit: I'm surprised I said clearly. DoubleBlue (Talk) 8 July 2005 20:56 (UTC)]

My guess, then is that far more templates look different between IE and Firefox than just this one. Template:Current uses a table, whereas Template:Cleanup uses just a div box. -- Netoholic @ 8 July 2005 19:41 (UTC)