Wikipedia talk:In the news/Archive 69

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(Closed) Updating the ITN criteria on how we select which nominations to post

No consensus to implement this proposal. Spencer^T•C 16:37, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

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

I'm writing this talk post to bounce ideas off of many of you regulars whom I see to frequent ITN. I know that I am a new and unexperienced editor relative to many of you, but I didn't want to let this stop me from making this observation. Hopefully this was the right place to make such a proposal - if not, I'd appreciate you letting me know of a better forum for making this proposal upon seeing this.

From my point of view, the status quo for how nominations at ITN tend to go right now is this:

Someone nominates an article. If insufficient sourcing of international news coverage is not attached, or the blurb is poorly written, these issues are fixed (otherwise the nom dies).
If the nominated article is found to be of insufficient quality, it is fairly quickly opposed on that grounds. The nomination then either dies, or the article is updated and we move on to...
ITN contributors (usually, wikipedia editors) then opine as to whether they personally think the article is "newsworthy". If a sufficient number of editors find the event to not be "worthy of being news", then the event/article does not get posted, despite high levels of international media coverage. Vice versa could also be true.

The entire existence of step (3) in the process runs completely contrary to what I would think ITN should be about, and from what I understand, what Wikipedia as a whole is about: impartiality. There is an implicit bias to what news people who regularly check ITN are going to get: it is going to be only that news which the typical Wikipedian/frequenter of ITN finds most worthy of being covered. The system is fundamentally biased against news which we do not, communally, find interesting.

So, here is my proposal: change the guidelines to eliminate deliberation on whether or not events are newsworthy enough to be considered "news" (avoiding questions like: is this important enough to make it to ITN? Did enough people die? Is it really meaningful enough in its impact?), and instead deliberate on whether the coverage is sufficient, internationally widespread, and diverse enough to merit posting. By doing this, we maintain our impartiality in the sense that we are deferring on the matter of newsworthiness to the actual journalists/professionals themselves. Let me know what you all think! Flip^and Flopped ツ 04:25, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

The problem, as repeatedly (and recently) pointed out is that ITN's purpose is not be a newspaper or news ticker but to showcase quality encyclopaedia articles about topics that are or have recently been in the news. By making our sole metric for inclusion the quantity of coverage in newspapers we just become a news aggregator. Internationality of coverage is also not a good metric as that would highlight relatively trivial stories that get picked-up widely for whatever reason (human interest, quirky, whatever) while reducing our ability to cover important stories that are less widely covered (e.g. general elections in small countries). Diversity of coverage is problematic for some types of story - there are many different ways you can cover something with a long backstory and many aspects (e.g. US presidential elections or the death of an octogenarian musician active since their teens) however the same is not true about unexpected events such as earthquakes or plane crashes, at least not in the first few days. Once you combine these metrics then what you have is exactly what we currently have. Thryduulf (talk) 12:34, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

The problem is not that we have a significance criteria, it's that people are not basing significance on an objective measure of any sort. Significance should be measurable based on some metric that anyone could assess, NOT on the whims of the particular people who happen to show up to comment that day, or who have the most aggressive insults when they post. The system we have now is "whoever can post their comments with the most derisive tone gets what they want". The purpose of ITN is to highlight quality articles. Like everywhere else on the main page. The reason something goes in ITN, besides another section, is "because it is likely people have already heard of the story because it's appearing prominently in news sources" not "because people who show up to vote at ITN have axes to grind and want to use it to control the message so that we only publish what they think is important". There is far too much of that. --Jayron 32 12:43, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Do you have something in mind for a metric? It would seem to me to be difficult to write one that most people here could agree with. 331dot (talk) 12:53, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I think the metric based on what news sources are covering the story (BBC vs. Supermarket Tabloid), how the sources are covering it (in their "serious news" departments vs. in their political gossip or celebrity departments), the tone of the coverage (gossipy vs. journalistic), the depth of coverage (single, short articles vs. multiple, long, well-developed articles), the wideness of the coverage (multiple sources each dedicating their own journalists to it, vs. a single source re-posted), etc. can all be used. I think, where we have debates about the merits of a post, we should be basing those debates on how a story is being covered relative to these metrics (for example, a story that the BBC is covering with multiple, multi-page articles in a journalistic tone vs. what a gossip rag posts). I expect that we wouldn't agree much more than we do today, but at least we would be having debates over objective criteria, instead of "I don't find this story interesting." If we want to avoid posting stories on Trumps ramblings or on the latest Kardashian dating gossip, set metrics that avoid those types of stories, but still get the stories that serious journalism is covering. It's not really that hard. --Jayron 32 13:57, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

That's a poor metric given 24/7 wall to wall news coverage today. The Kavanaugh nomination process is an example of such. It was treated seriously by the news for at least 2 weeks straight, but all of that coverage was focused on the sexual allegations and how that would be handled or if that would stall the process. All serious journalistic coverage (internationally too), but from an ITN standpoint, with very little concrete actual stories to report and instead more well-informed speculation and opinion. That happens far too much in the news nowadays and that itself doesn't make for good ITN nominations. --Masem (t) 14:09, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Quite so. And with agencies parroting such garbage, the metrics would undergo such skewing as to render them beyond useless into harmful territory. Why do newspapers exist? To sell copy. The Rambling Man (talk) 14:47, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Why does ITN exist? To enforce the personal viewpoints of the people who have showed up, and can yell the loudest. --Jayron 32 14:57, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

If you say so, you're the admin. In my opinion, ITN exists to rationalise the vast array of non-encycopledic-value story-cruft we see passing through sometimes multiple times on a daily basis. A community-led discussion including opinions from around the globe should be considered when building the content of ITN, not some arbitrary metric which is deeply and systemically skewed by news stories from just one or two parts of the known universe. The Rambling Man (talk) 15:01, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion, but this has been discussed to death many times before. As Thryduulf states, there are good reasons for the way things are now. Wikipedia as a whole is written based on what editors deem notable; Wikipedia does not cover every entity or subject in existence. ITN is similar, it is not meant to cover every news story, and editorial control and judgement must be used. If consensus is that ITN should be a news ticker, then that's what it would be, but I would strongly oppose such a move. 331dot (talk) 12:39, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

You can best resolve #2 by working to improve nominated articles instead of merely commenting how articles are not getting improved. You can best resolve #3 by participating at ITNC and encouraging others to. 331dot (talk) 12:41, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

More would participate if they weren't insulted out of the process by those who are more interested in winning battles with others than in getting quality articles on the main page. --Jayron 32 12:43, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I don't think that problem is unique to ITN, but happens in many places around Wikipedia. 331dot (talk) 12:55, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

That is does happen doesn't mean that it's right that it happens. --Jayron 32 13:52, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

All I'm saying is that it is an issue with a broader scope and I don't know how you fix it. 331dot (talk) 15:01, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I don't see point 2 as being a main problem right now - enough articles are getting approved that the Main Page always has content. The problem is the non-encyclopaedic, subjective basis upon which those articles are being selected for posting once they reach step 3. I agree with what you and others have said, in the sense that ITNC could become overflowed with submissions if we didn't have some kind of significance criteria. ITN only has so much space - a logical concern. The core problem that I'm getting at here, though, is that I don't know how holistically appropriate it is for us to post one natural disaster, for example, because editors think those peoples deaths mattered more than the deaths of the people involved in another disaster. It doesn't seem whatsoever encyclopaedic. Perhaps we could brainstorm solutions to that problem, like adding some principle similar to what I've proposed whilst also expanding ITNR to reduce the clutter of some easily 'repetitive' or 'easily coverable, but actually relatively unimportant' articles like @The Rambling Man: or @Thryduulf: mention. I don't exactly care if what I proposed is the way we solve the problem; I just agree with the crux of what Jayron32 has said in the sense that right now ITNC has no real systematic, encyclopaedic way of determining significance. All subjective. Flip^and Flopped ツ 13:03, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I think the best way of starting a discussion about a different method of selecting what we post would be to look through the archives over a long period (probably at least 6 months) and place every nomination into one of the following categories:

Posted (or would have been posted except for quality reasons) and should have been posted
Posted (or would have been posted except for quality reasons) but should not have been posted
Not posted for reasons other than quality but should have been posted
Not posted for reasons other than quality and should not have been posted
Not posted for quality reasons but unable to tell whether it would have been posted otherwise

i.e. the current system worked for categories 1 and 4 but did not work for categories 2 and 3. Category 5 is included for completeness but isn't really that useful for analysis. For each entry in categories 1-4 a very brief summary of the reason why it was/wasn't posted and why you do or don't agree with that would be most useful.

Yes this is a huge amount of work, but until we can see in what ways the current system is working and in what ways it isn't working there is no useful way to improve it. Thryduulf (talk) 13:23, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

The main problem I see with your approach is that there will almost definitely be huge contention over how one would define what "should" and "should not" have been posted - that's the entire crux of the problem. Who are the editors voting to decide what should and shouldn't be posted on the "in the news" section of an encyclopedia which should be as objective and impartial as possible? Those editors opinions about signifiance are not objective nor impartial. As opposed to the holistic methodology you suggest, perhaps it would be sufficient for me to go back and find a multitude of instances where one event or article was posted, whilst another which is very similar in category or type but only slightly nuanced in difference was not posted, presumably for subjective reasons amongst those who voted, or perhaps even because the pools of people who happened to be voting at the time of nomination were different. It would illustrate that there is at least some extent of system failure going on, and that that is creating inequities in what gets posted for the wrong reasons. Does that make sense to you? Regardless, maybe we can work together to draft some sort of analysis plan that would get the most community support possible if the analysis were actually to be carried out. Flip^and Flopped ツ 17:40, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I think I raised the inevitable consequence of this approach, to just post "decent articles" that are simply "in the news", I could flood ITNC every day with nine or ten items from England which would hit those criteria. And as for the US, Trump etc, we'd be getting dozens of nominations per day, the Kardashians would be on the main page every other day.... We need to filter it, this is an encyclopedia. Just posting good quality articles is a recipe for complete ITN meltdown. I think that's why we have the disastrous Wikinews, and the soon-to-be disastrous WikiTRIBUNE. The Rambling Man (talk) 12:43, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Just an idea -- trying to brainstorm and see if anything sticks. What if we imposed a daily cap on the number of nominations we post, in a system where reviewing admins at the end of the day evaluate the community's consensus on which news has the most internationally spread, but also substantive coverage? By adding well-defined substantiveness criteria to the metric we could eliminate a lot of the 'fluff' news that many of the editors here are concerned about. Flip^andFlopped ツ 13:13, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
- The other problem is that we have to be considered with news sensationalism, the fact that news is now 24/7 means they have a lot of dead air to fill, and that can create unbalanced coverage in certain topic areas (particularly anything dealing with the US and the current administration). Something might have substantial coverage but a lot of that is actually fluff; the case in point of the current package bombs - they were found, recovered and dealt with before anyone was harmed, and FBI + others are investigating. It is not much of a story but because its election season, and those targeted could be seen anti-Trump, analysts and talking-heads are all trying to vie for the best theories of who's behind it. There's not much of a story there. (Someone brought up the Congressional baseball shooting where no one beyond the perp died, but there, there was actually a story of how the event went down, how people were protected, and how they took down the shooter.) We have to ask that if the event in question took place in any other part of the world, but otherwise with the same scale and magnitude, would it likely be covered to the same depth. Most cases, that's no. --Masem (t) 13:56, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
- No, artificial deadlines (e.g. "the end of the day") aren't appropriate either, this is a 24/7/365 website, with valued input from around the globe. The Rambling Man (talk) 14:30, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
Comment WP:N should be fine, I don't understand why it isn't. --LaserLegs (talk) 15:26, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
- For all practical purposes, WP:N is not to be used as a metric for current news stories, because WP:N is designed at enduring coverage, not bursts of coverage that the news gives. WP:NEVENT tries to judge that, but still, again not every article-worthy, in-the-news topic is necessarily ITN appropriate, like the Kavanaugh hearings. A standalone article on that is reasonable, but its still not ITN. --Masem (t) 15:30, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
I profoundly disagree with removing the assessment of each story's significance. P:CE exists as a venue for all updated content; just take a look at the green boxes on WP:ITN/C for the sheer number of items that entails (the number has gone down lately, but that's before it come with the exposure of being on the main page). Of course not all of those would meet the quality requirements, but it would still be dozens of items a day. It's totally impractical for us to assess that many nominations, even just on quality, and readers would not be served by having each blurb rotate off within 3 or 4 hours of being posted. Others have pointed out the problem that the selection of stories that get widespread coverage in the 24/7 news media is very different from those with major encyclopaedic value. Modest Genius ^talk 15:29, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
I support Flipandflopped's proposal. As noted above, we've discussed this many times before (most recently, just earlier this month). But some users here just aren't getting the point, which is that if a news event isn't notable enough to have a standalone article or at least two paragraphs update, it won't be notable enough for ITN. That's a perfectly fine, objective criterion, and it will not open the floodgates for whichever viral story to appear on ITN, as the critics of this proposal are claiming. Davey2116 (talk) 16:53, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Here's what I wrote in the thread from earlier this month: Davey2116 (talk) 16:53, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

"I lean strongly towards emphasizing article quality over notability. For one, article quality is objective, while notability is not; so if we focus on article quality, fewer arguments of "systemic bias" (either in favor or against the U.S.) can be made. Also, the purpose of having an ITN box on Wikipedia, instead of having our readers go see what CNN is listing as its biggest headline of the moment, is to highlight quality WP content. For me, we have no obligation to restrict the front page to "very notable" stories (i.e., stories that news sites restrict their front page for). Instead, we have an obligation to restrict the front page to quality WP content. Thirdly, for me, an acceptable notability standard is already included in the article quality requirement; if a recent event does not have an article, or no quality update to an existing article can be written, then the event is not notable enough for ITN. (1/3)
"Therefore, I want to see any event with a quality, standalone article be posted to ITN. Some examples of articles that would've been posted under this standard: Brett Kavanaugh Supreme Court nomination, Neil Gorsuch Supreme Court nomination, Dismissal of James Comey, as well as all of the mass shootings in the U.S. that we rejected over the past two years (apologies that I only remember the major U.S. stories). Many editors who want to keep notability as a standard for ITN like to bring up that removing it would allow whichever Kardashian's latest viral social media post to be posted. Unless there's a quality article on Kardashian's viral Instagram post of October 2018, it is plain that that's not what I'm advocating for. (2/3)
"Where we would consider notability is for events that do not have a standalone article but do have a quality update to an existing article. The more extensive and well-sourced the update is, the less we need to consider notability. It follows that I would maintain the current guideline to not post any (non-RD) story with less than four sentences' update. (3/3)" Davey2116 (talk) 16:53, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm sad to say that's not the reality. I could easily write two paragraphs for every single news event that is featured on the BBC during the day (e.g. nine or ten major headline stories) and then nominate them at ITNC (of course, assuming the rest of the article was up to scratch). Indeed, if we released the dogs of war and removed the discussion and turned into pure objective metric-based decision-making, we could just get AI-bots to update everything newsworthy based on the metrics against which these articles may be compared. The problem there, of course, is the deluge of non-encyclopedic-valuable crap we'll have to wade through to get to the real news. If people want that approach, WikiNews or WikiTRIBUNE is the answer, not this encyclopedia. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:57, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

If you could, then do so. If you asked me to write two paragraphs on each of these topics (the top ones for the UK section I'm seeing right now) without it getting immediately removed for being irrelevant, then I'd rightly say that you're being ridiculous:

Megan Lee: Pair guilty of girl's takeaway allergy death
Lord Hain branded 'arrogant' for naming Sir Philip Green
Ruth Davidson gives birth to baby boy
Cot designer jailed over baby's death
Fracking in Lancashire suspended following earthquake
Man mistaken for 'scarecrow' run over on Alresford road
Brexit won't ruin Strictly Come Dancing - No 10
Road rage driver Darren Hefferman jailed for cyclist punch
Asda considering up to 2,500 job cuts
Harry and Meghan jet aborts landing due to runway hitch
Ryanair flight rant man says he is 'not a racist'
Liverpool roads could close during school run

Meanwhile, the top story at BBC is the arrest of a suspect in the mail bomb attacks. You also mentioned above that Kardashians would appear on ITN "every other day". Today is October 26, so statistically speaking they should have generated 13 stories of encyclopedic value this month. Try to find them. Davey2116 (talk) 17:07, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Yep, that’s a snapshot, and it changes every hour, and I could easily update any given article by a para or two. Walk in the park. And that’s just the UK, imagine adding the US, Canada, India, Europe, Russia, etc etc etc. Overwhelming and useless to an encyclopaedia. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:36, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I'm looking forward to your two-paragraph update to the Brexit negotiations article about how the PM says that some celebrity dancing show won't be "ruined". Laughable. And, as noted in my comment in the earlier thread, where we would consider notability is for events that do not have a standalone article but do have a quality update to an existing article. The more extensive and well-sourced the update is, the less we need to consider notability. So under my proposal your two-paragraph update on Strictly probably wouldn't make it to ITN anyway. (My proposal is that if you write a whole article on it and it survives AfD, then we can post it.) Davey2116 (talk) 17:48, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

As has been said, a bot could do that. This sort of news ticker proposal come up every now and then, but the reasons for not doing it have not changed. 331dot (talk) 17:50, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

And why is that a bad thing? To me, removing the contentiousness of ITN discussions by laying out objective criteria is a bonus. What I'm saying is that the reasons you've relied on all along are extremely weak. Davey2116 (talk) 17:56, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

We removed contention from RD because that was simple and notability in almost all cases was already established. It is simply not feasible to do that to main ITN stories as we would be inundated with nominations, all of which would need to be assessed. It would make matters a lot worse. We’ve been over this too many times. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:59, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

As I've shown above, that's a non-issue. We currently get an average of four ITN nominations per day. Because that number includes RD, I'd say if we get two more ITN nominations per day, we'd agree it would be noticeably more (still, nowhere near an "inundation"). That means to support your claim, you have to find (26 doubled =) 52 fully-sourced articles about current news events from this month or two-paragraph updates that you think are sufficiently notable. I'd be surprised if you could even find a quarter of that. Davey2116 (talk) 18:10, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

You've "shown" nothing of the sort. I would happily nominate six to eight UK-related stories per day if we had no discussions and pure objective criteria to meet. Easy, as I noted. And then, as I have shown, you'll have the US, Canada, India, Russia etc etc etc all doing the same. So instead of 2 extra nominations per day, I'd be looking at more like 32. Trial it, and you'll see. I'll certainly be up for it. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:12, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Then let's do so. Your two-paragraph update on Strictly would be SNOW closed. The notability bar on events without standalone articles would be pretty high. (That's why I didn't support the mail bomb nom until after its article was created.) Davey2116 (talk) 18:16, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

You missed the point, I only need to select one story per hour, e.g. Ruth’s baby. I don’t need to select Strictly. In an hour or so, a load more stories are available for me to choose between. All of them would be fair to nominate in your version. All of them would need to be assessed. Dozens more noms per day. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:19, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

The point actually should be why would you nominate articles you actually don't want to appear on the main page except that you wish to disrupt the process and swamp it with bullshit, so as to prevent other people from doing good work? That seems like a phenomenally bad idea. --Jayron 32 18:21, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

What are you talking about? Nominations are to alert others to items that may or not be of interest to our readers. It’s not about what I want to see. If I only ever worked on that, it would be a phenomenally bad idea. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:26, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps I chose bad words. To rephrase: you proposing that you set about nominating articles for discussion which you would be against appearing on the main page, if asked to vote on such nominations by others. I don't understand why that would be a good use of your time, unless you were just trying to get in the way. --Jayron 32 18:32, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

No, that’s not what I’m proposing. Where are you getting all this stuff? If someone changes the rules wholesale then we change how we approach ITN. It would be unreasonable to expect anything else. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:35, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

No, it seems you've missed the point. The two-paragraph update is more of a minimum threshold for exceptional candidates than a guideline; I can't actually think of any story notable enough to pass my proposal with a two-paragraph update and not already have its own standalone article. The point is that checking for notability is already done at AfD if necessary. If you can create articles on any of the subjects above, then go ahead and nominate them. But since you likely can't even write a two-paragraph update on them without it getting removed for irrelevance, there's no point in nominating them. Davey2116 (talk) 18:27, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
We already have an update guideline and we already don’t post AFD-subject articles. Didn’t you know? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:29, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I might as well ask you the same question. Why would you nominate stories for which you can't even write a two-paragraph update? And you've muddled for yourself the definition of "converse" and "contrapositive". Sure, we don't post AfD-subject articles, but that doesn't mean any article that passed AfD gets posted. That's what I'm proposing. Davey2116 (talk) 18:34, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Where did I ever say I’d nominate something I couldn’t satisfactorily update? Try again. It’d be easy to write two paras on Ruth’s new baby, for instance. Then wait an hour to the next round of stories. And that’s just the UK. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:37, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Then try writing two paragraphs for it. You probably can't without being excessively detailed and un-encyclopedic. The article currently just has one short sentence for an update. The point is, even if you could, Ruth's baby just wouldn't pass the notability bar for an event with just a two-paragraph update. Davey2116 (talk) 18:41, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Well since the BBC and many other news outlets have managed several column inches, same sex relations party leader baby etc, it would be easy. And if someone wants to expand things they’re interested in, this would be a perfect lever to get it into the main page. And nothing would stop the nominations, regardless, so your claim of snow close is nonsense, we rarely do that based on lack of update, so we? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:46, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Huh? It would be extremely clear if someone was just trying to add fluff to reach two paragraphs. For instance, it would be redundant to re-state that Davidson is homosexual and the party leader in the two-paragraph update, since that's stated in the article elsewhere and is not new. And the exact weight of the baby is not notable enough to be encyclopedic. Moreover, your assertion about SNOW close shows you've missed the point of my proposal. Here it is briefly: If an event has a standalone article, it gets posted. If an event has only a two-paragraph update, it would have to be extremely notable, since the AfD process is the mechanism we're using to assess notability. Davey2116 (talk) 18:53, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

No, you've lost the plot here. All your counter-arguments are based on subjective criteria, something that I thought you were working to avoid. Sorry, you lost me, and probably most others with your attempts here. "extremely notable" is subjective and always going to need discussion. That's where we are already. You've wasted a lot of time I'm afraid. The Rambling Man (talk) 23:51, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

You've still missed my point. I can't tell if you're doing this deliberately. As I've explained countless times, the main change to the current guidelines I'm proposing is that every news event with a standalone article gets posted. That's not subjective at all, so your response kind of falls flat. I added the two-paragraphs thing mostly due to your ridiculous Kardashian complaints. So yes, those may involve some discussion, but I'm fine with that since that's not the main point of my proposal. Besides, what I have in mind are exceptional nominations which are very notable but for whatever reason don't have their own article (mostly the Nobel prizes and other prizes listed at ITN/R). Davey2116 (talk) 03:05, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Sorry, until you define what you want to trial, and make it clear to everyone what changes you are proposing, you're simply wasting time here. Right now, it appears that your only "innovation" is to automatically post items with new articles, assuming they survive AFD and are still relevant and not stale after that process. How many times did a "new article" get nominated at ITN and get to a required standard and then not be posted? That sounds like a solution looking for a problem. All the other stuff is pretty much what we do already. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:56, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Huh? Do you even read what I write? I clearly stated above that there are many examples of articles that would've been posted under this proposal, including Brett Kavanaugh Supreme Court nomination, Neil Gorsuch Supreme Court nomination, Dismissal of James Comey, and all of the mass shootings that we chose not to post. And those are just the U.S. stories. Davey2116 (talk) 03:44, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I think that's the textbook definition of being hoisted by your own petard, so congrats. Do continue. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:31, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

*"And those are just the U.S. stories" is exactly the principal opposition to removing the significance criterion - there are far too many stories that would be posted. There are only 4-6 slots on ITN (depending on blurb length and main page balance), if we posted everything from everywhere then the actually significant stories would rotate off in a matter of hours at most.
If we just look at what is on the BBC News homepage that has a Wikipedia article a the moment, ITN would consist of: 2018 Leicester City F.C. helicopter crash/Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha, 2018 Formula One World Championship, Lion Air Flight 610, 2018 Australian ball-tampering scandal, Brazilian general election, 2018. The New York times list would be Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, Brazilian general election, 2018, Lion Air Flight 610, 2018 World Series, Brad Parscale/Donald Trump presidential campaign, 2020. Meanwhile a-Sydney Morning Herald based list would be 2018 Australian ball-tampering scandal, Lion Air Flight 610, Northern Beaches Hospital, Australia–Israel relations, Geoffrey Rush. The South China Morning Post has Lion Air Flight 610, Addis Ababa–Djibouti Railway, Cannabis in Canada, Cathay Pacific, 2018 China–United States trade war.
So looking at just four news sources we have about 15 stories with articles for 4-6 slots. And this is not looking at anything from other English-speaking countries Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Canada, Cyprus, Singapore, etc, let alone the rest of the world. Thryduulf (talk) 09:35, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

There is no "rest of the world". The Rambling Man (talk) 18:33, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Drafting a trial run proposal

@The Rambling Man:, @331dot: if you really think that this change in guidelines would prompt a flooding of good faith nominations due to the more lax criteria, why not give it a trial run and see? (really big emphasis on the good faith part of that - purposefully swamping the system as has been described is not good faith). If the trial run fails miserably and ITN becomes nothing more than a news ticker that spits out "fluff", or "irrelevant articles", and ITNC flooded with nominations, then we don't need to have this discussion ever again. The trial run will fail. So, here's a subheading for people to indicate their support or opposition to the mere idea of drafting a trial proposal for this form of change - that is, about whether or not we should be individually evaluating whether or not we think articles are 'worthy' enough in terms of significance.

Obviously, I would support as the initial proposer. I can't see swarms of new edits from the community suddenly showing up here due to some kind of strange opportunistic desire to get more things posted (as you all seem to describe). I think it will be largely the same pool of regular contributors. I also think hat so long as we make sufficient updates to things like ITN/R and to the guidelines, which make the criteria for determining significance more clear, and which make what kind of news coverage is suitable for posting more clear, the so-called "inundation" will not occur and we will see marginally more candidacies put through, at most. Ultimately, we could test all of that if we can get support for the idea of developing a trial run. Flip^and Flopped ツ 18:42, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
Support There's absolutely no harm in trying it. And as I've been saying, it will likely work better than what we have now. Davey2116 (talk) 18:44, 26 October 2018 (UTC)
Trying what? What is the proposal? What are the aims? What is being modified from the current ITN criteria? What is the duration of the trial? What are the desired outcomes? What the ...? The Rambling Man (talk)
Oppose but only because I can’t see what the new criteria are compared to the old criteria. Show me what changes and I might reconsider, otherwise this is like Brexit, voting for the complete unknown. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:48, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

By supporting, you're only recognizing that the problem outlined in my original posting exists (with regards to inconsistency, over-subjectivity, inequity in how we determine article newsworthiness) which necessitates a proposed change in the guidelines and a subsequent trial run of those changes. If you don't agree with the parameters of the ultimate proposed change, that's fine, you can vote to oppose at that point. If you don't think that there is even a problem, you're also free to maintain the oppose vote. I hope that helps clarify. Flip^and Flopped ツ 18:56, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

What, "by supporting"? I opposed. I am beginning to wonder what you're doing here. Your statement is all very fulsome with big words, but I'mm afraid I don't buy any of it. You clearly have no well-defined approach here, so once you do, let me know and I'll reconsider. The Rambling Man (talk) 00:17, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Support a trial run of some sort. If ITN becomes unusable, or if unworthy articles get posted into ITN because of it, we'll have data to work from. --Jayron 32 18:50, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

By the way, if we want a model, we could dig up the trial run we did for the most recent RD criteria change. We did that a while back, just like this, and would make a good model for how to run this one. --Jayron 32 18:51, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Definitely think that would be useful! Obviously not the exact same parameters considering that there are distinctions to be made between how we evaluate RD and more general ITN candidacies, but something along those lines is definitely what I had in mind. Flip^and Flopped ツ 18:57, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

What, exactly, are you supporting? The Rambling Man (talk) 23:52, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Oppose 1) without knowing what the specific changes to be trialed are- and 2) I also believe a brief trial will not show what actually will happen. It would take a long time, perhaps a year, for people to realize that ITN is wide open as a news ticker. I don't believe any problems that exist warrant news ticker-fying ITN and it is always those dissatisfied with what consensus reaches who want to change the system. No change will work until it has buy-in from most people. People who want to post news should direct their energies to the aforementioned projects where that is the goal. 331dot (talk) 19:35, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I also again restate that a bot could accomplish what this proposal seeks to do. People could just plug information into a form and bam- posted to ITN. You wouldn't need us. 331dot (talk) 19:38, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Oppose. Far too little information about what is actually being proposed - compare with Wikipedia talk:In the news/2016 RD proposal#[Enacted] Trial run where there was a very clear statement about what was being trialled and how long the trial would last for. Thryduulf (talk) 20:29, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

I know this. I'm just trying to gauge whether or not putting the work into drafting such a proposal is even going to be worth my time if (for reasons akin to what 331dot has said) editors are opposed to the idea of having a trial run, irregardless of its parameters, on principle. Flip^and Flopped ツ 20:35, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

See also my new section below, but you're going about it backwards. Develop your proposal first, then people can discuss whether they support trialling it. Thryduulf (talk) 20:39, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Oppose based on a key factor from the RD RFC, in that we assumed that an existing article was sufficiently notable to start. We've only since had a few cases where an article created due to news of the person's death were made and came to reasonably resolve on those. Most stories that are blurbs that are not ITNR are recently created articles (the day of the news event) and do not have the time to assure that NEVENT and other notability facets are met. This is not to say that our decisions at ITN are normally only based on notability (the Kavanaugh nomination clearly is a notable standalone topic, one we didn't post), but we've also had articles that barely pass notability be nominated too, and this trial would likely encourage more. --Masem (t) 13:23, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Oppose even as a trial. Removing the importance criteria is a terrible idea which would fundamentally change the purpose of ITN. Contribute to P:CE if you want to list every event with an article, regardless of how minor. Modest Genius ^talk 20:37, 28 October 2018 (UTC)

What is the actual problem

After a couple of hours work I've produced User:Thryduulf/ITN analysis a work-in-progress list of all the non-RD nominations made at ITNC in September (only the 19th-30th is complete so far). Which nominations were posted that should not have been and which that were not posted should have been? Why? It's all very well saying "it's too subjective" but until you can give objective statements about what is currently wrong it is going to be impossible to create objective criteria. At present we have little more than "I don't like it because it's subjective.". Thryduulf (talk) 20:43, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

@Flipandflopped: I've updated this so it contains nearly the whole month's worth of nominations. Please go through it and detail which nominations would have had a different outcome, and why, if your proposed trial had been in force. If you do it somewhere other than here please leave a link. Thryduulf (talk) 12:37, 27 October 2018 (UTC)
I'd argue that if we based the decisions on coverage by media rather than personal interest, several of the "A2" ranked nominations would be "B2", including the Kavanaugh nomination, the Massachusetts gas explosion, the Kolkata bridge collapse. There are several "A2" nominations that did not have significant media coverage, and those would have not succeeded. I think there's also a "chilling effect" that has been going on in that people have avoided nominating stories that would have otherwise been posted, which I think is hard to quantify unless we run the trial with the new set of requirements first. --Jayron 32 15:43, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
Which begs a question of if there is a chilling effect, which would require re-reviewing these to identify noms from "the regulars" (those that submit and or comment at least once a day to ITNC) and from non-regulars (anyone far less frequent). My judgement is that there are regulars that know they post stories that are "in the news" but unsure if they will pass (a "see if it sticks to the wall" approach, and certainly not impacted by a chilling effect if there is one); it is generally that we get so few noms from non-regulars that this might be hard to judge. --Masem (t) 16:02, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
I think there's strong consensus against a trial here in any case, especially as it's completely unclear as to the parameters that define such. It's such a high-profile risk that the very best I could possibly imagine would be to run a "behind-the-scenes" trial which would compare the results of normal ITN activity (i.e. the status quo) against the trial ITN activity, for assessment post-trial. It'd be far too risky to enable what I think is being suggested above to run on the main page. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:07, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
I'd like to know how this is more high-risk than the RD trial we ran earlier? --Jayron 32 17:50, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
The names of deceased individuals, just two words (in general), with no blurb, was of very limited risk, especially as we had already established their notability within the encyclopedia as they had an article. This trial, if I can interpret what it means, makes no such judgement at all. We shouldn't risk even a day of the main page on such a navel-gazing exercise, let alone the two weeks (?) we did on the RD trial. Plus, as noted before, many times, there's no clear indication as to what we're even going to trial. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:04, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
Actually, the proposed trial is more restrictive than the RD one, because it has defined standards. Furthermore, ITN's purpose is to highlight quality content; blurbs that explain the context of a link to that quality article are not inherently "risky". I fail to see how a blurb causes a risk; if the article is good enough, what is the risk that someone reads it? --Jayron 32 18:07, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
The risk is not about the quality of the article in this case, it's about the notability of the update. I think that's pretty obvious. Oh, and since you know all about the "proposed trial" and its restrictions, please bullet point the details so we can all see it please. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:12, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

See also my comments above - from just one morning's news in just four media sources I found 15 stories that had relevant encyclopaedia articles that had an update. Per my understanding of the proposal I did not look at the quality of the update, simply that there was one. Which 4-6 of those 15 should be posted and how are you determining that? Thryduulf (talk) 19:46, 29 October 2018 (UTC) (ps the RD trial was 1 calendar month). Thryduulf (talk) 19:47, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
Comment this is obviously doomed to failure: the regulars would rather be POV warriors pushing literature and architecture awards that no one cares about than feature quality content about subjects which are "in the news". The problem we need to fix is that the significance criteria is used to keep content off the main page, instead of to justify it's inclusion. The endless bickering at ITN/C and the often staleness of the template flies in the face of the WP:ITN#Purpose of ITN. Oh well. --LaserLegs (talk) 00:59, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Draft trial proposal

A blurb can be proposed at ITN Candidates and added with consensus to ITN if an event:
is in the news, supported by three independent news sources and

a related article has been updated with at minimum 300 words, or a new related article has been created with at least 500 words.

So what this means is:

From Wikipedia:In the news#Criteria, suspend the Significance criterion for a one-month trial run. Comments like: 'this is not important' or 'this is really significant' become less relevant and should help stem pointless arguments.
Editors would still need to judge the quality of the update; so for example whether it is grammatical, is suitable for inclusion in that particular article, is the rest of the article sourced, etc. This, along with the length of the update, should be a limiting factor in preventing random tabloid-esque stories from appearing and indundating ITN.

I would ask that we refrain from !voting because the above bickering is really not helpful. Any constructive feedback is as always welcome. Fuebaey (talk) 00:45, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

My first thought is that this will significantly increase the number of stories that we post - do you have any thoughts about how we keep the supernotable stories (e.g. Lion Air flight 610) from being pushed off ITN by less significant ones (e.g. Thirty-seventh Amendment of the Constitution Bill 2018). Thryduulf (talk) 01:16, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I was initially against removing the significance criterion for RD nominations in 2016 for the exact same reason many above have cited for blurbs above - it will flood ITN. We trialled it for a month and it didn't happen. Why? Because while there was 10+ notable deaths per day, not all of them were updated suitably. My opinion on 'supernotable vs notable' is similar to my opinion on the perennial 'RD vs blurb' question. The original issue (bickering over significance) would remain and there would be no point in suspending the criterion to maintain that facade. Those unfamiliar with ITN see it as a breaking news RSS feed. I'm hoping most of the regulars don't see it primarily that way and err more towards showcasing better quality articles. Fuebaey (talk) 15:55, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Oppose. Without any significance criterion ITN will become the RSS news feed. I know you compare this to the RD trial, but RD only deals with one specific event (death) to one class of articles (biographies) putting a natural limit on the number of potential stories. There is no such limit with the main ITN section as it covers every event (including death) in every type of article (including biographies). The recent helicopter crash could have filled two slots on its own - one with the article about the crash, one with the article about the notable passenger. Removing the significance criterion would turn ITN into a very poor analogue of an RSS news feed. Thryduulf (talk) 21:03, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

I respect that. I guess where we both differ is that I already see ITN as such. Improving articles has always been secondary to subjective significance. Fuebaey (talk) 21:33, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Added to Thryduulf's concerns, what constitutes an "independent news source"? Would a story featured in The Sun, The Daily Mirror and The Daily Express qualify? The Rambling Man (talk) 15:49, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

I'd like to think WP:V applies regardless of any ITN project guidelines we come up with here. Fuebaey (talk) 15:58, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Well if that's a "yes" then this proposal is doomed from the start as just about any story in the verifiable local press in the UK will be capable of meeting a nominal update and hence passing the proposed trial criteria. As I noted several times, I could nominate a dozen stories a day, just from my region in the UK, which would meet these criteria. This is the news ticker we all reject. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:02, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

So you have stated more than several times on this page already. The thing is I don't see you updating those articles. Absent of that your argument is becoming quite hollow. Fuebaey (talk) 16:11, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Not at all. What's "quite hollow" is this proposal (and your snide snarky little dig). These trial inclusion criteria will open the floodgates, just look at the stories mentioned in the previous section that would have waltzed across the main page, and note: "that's just from the US"!!! Oh, and what you "see me doing" is irrelevant. Let me know when the vote opens. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:14, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

You're right. We can't force people to edit. Why not a link some recent events that are in the news that already have a suitable article update. That way we can get a rough idea on how fast ITN will rotate. Like from Portal:Current events/2018 October 23:

Ancient Black Sea shipwrecks - no update
Replica Titanic - no update
Repubblica – Teatro dell'Opera (Rome Metro) - one sentence update
Hurricane Willa - new article, this was posted
Killing of Jamal Khashoggi - this was updated, but we posted this as ongoing not blurb
October 2018 United States mail bombing attempts - new article, this was posted
Terrorism in Canada - no update
Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting - no update

Obviously a snapshot, but three new stories a day isn't floodgates by any means. Fuebaey (talk) 21:08, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Comparing things listed in the news ticker portal is not the same as comparing items which are listed at ITNC, of course. And changing the rules to make anything automatically eligible for main page inclusion will modify people's behaviour, as noted above we'd see dozens more entries from the US alone. This is a dead duck. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:14, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

How new is new? At the moment we have five news items, all which have dedicated articles, but only two of which were recently created. The World Series article, for instance, was created on 3 August. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:20, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

I took 'new' to mean created in response to a surprising recent event (mainly disasters) rather than a recurring sport event/election. The minimum word length is flexible - feel free to suggest numbers if you feel it is too low or high. Fuebaey (talk) 16:44, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

Right, so articles which just get a trivial update, like the winner of an election, don't get posted at all. And no, there's no "minimum word length" that I would consider useful. It will just lead to people fluffing up updates to secure their place (for all of an hour or so) on the main page. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:27, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

The issue of quantity and quality of updates was raised in the prior discussion. Here there is a minimum quantitive requirement that also needs to be assessed for quality by editors at ITNC. Removing the same significance requirement for RD didn't open the floodgates, why are we crystal balling that it'll be different here? Fuebaey (talk) 21:08, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

I think you've been told why, quite a few times now, so if you refuse to hear that, it's your problem. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:14, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

I think we've reached the point where we're talking past each other. I guess I'll agree to disagree then. Fuebaey (talk) 21:33, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

I am not a fan of this idea. The result would be too many trivial stories posted when we try to be an encyclopedia. The number of words is too arbitrary as well - sometimes a short update describes the event well enough, sometimes a whole article is needed. --Tone 19:06, 30 October 2018 (UTC)
I opposed a trial in the section above, and continue to do so. So did most users who commented. Why are we now debating the wording of a trial that does not have consensus support? This is a terrible idea. Modest Genius ^talk 19:11, 30 October 2018 (UTC)
For the record, I oppose this trial, it will be damaging to Wikipedia's main page and runs completely contrary to the true application of an encyclopedia. For news tickers, please see Wikinews or WikiTRIBUNE, or Portal:Current events, and leave the main page to those items with genuine encyclopedic value, not some arbitrary numerical addition of words plus coverage in any three sources. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:15, 30 October 2018 (UTC)
I don't mind a trial to remove the significance criterion as long as there's also a trial to remove the quality criterion. Banedon (talk) 21:50, 30 October 2018 (UTC)
Support in principle but I'm opposed to arbitrary thresholds. Simply "the item is in the news, reported by reliable sources, and is a comprehensive overview of the subject" is good enough for me. The quality gate is obviously critical. Interestingly, this would actually filter out a large amount of the disaster porn we currently promote, where almost nothing beyond death toll is known about whatever transportation disaster/terrorist attack/engineering failure is being featured. --LaserLegs (talk) 00:47, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
Since we're all !voting, I'll support this proposal. I wouldn't mind trialing removing the quality criterion as well per Banedon; obviously I wouldn't want that to be permanent, but I'd look at the results of the trial of course. (TRM had been saying that "there wasn't a concrete proposal" as if that were some clever substantive argument, when clearly something along the lines of this proposal by Fuebaey was exactly what I (and TRM) had in mind.) Davey2116 (talk) 03:50, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
Certainly that's complete nonsense as far as the parts of the statement that relate to me and my understanding of this "proposal". And anyone seeking to remove the quality criterion from this really is in complete confusion as to what this whole project is about. Honestly, that must be some kind of joke. The Rambling Man (talk) 12:55, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

You need only go re-read your earlier comments here to see that I'm making sense and you're not; above, you repeatedly brought up that there was no concrete proposal to comment on, even though you knew that this proposal by Fuebaey is exactly what I meant. Moreover, this proposal is a trial, so your arguments have zero evidence (read: are complete bullpuckey) until we actually go through with a trial. Look at the others who are opposed to removing the significance criterion who are not opposed to a trial, just like how I am opposed to removing the quality criterion but not opposed to a trial. Davey2116 (talk) 20:24, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

@Davey2116: it is unreasonable to require another editor to read your mind. When TRM said there wasn't a concrete proposal, there was no concrete proposal - Fuebay wrote this one later. I can't speak for TRM, but I oppose a trial removal of the significance criterion because even in the unlikely event it achieves its objectives this will not be an an improvement to the status quo. Removing the quality criterion, even for a trial period, will (not could, will) result in very significant reputational damage to Wikipedia - go read the history of why we have a BLP policy (Wikipedia Seigenthaler biography incident is not a bad place to start) remembering that Wikipedia is a *lot* more prominent now than it was in 2005 and that controversy didn't involve the main page - the most viewed page on the project by several orders of magnitude. Thryduulf (talk) 21:07, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

@Thryduulf: The problem with your first sentence is that there was already a proposal written by Flipandflopped, so the statement, "there was no concrete proposal", is categorically false. Besides, not only was I not requiring TRM to read my mind, he was using this "there was no concrete proposal" argument while also commenting on the substance of this proposal. Finally, the "remove the quality criterion" proposal was not my idea, and I'm obviously as opposed to it in principle as you are; if such a trial went through, it better make an exception for BLP violations. I am only indifferent to allowing a trial since some users are conditioning their support of the "remove significance" trial on it. Davey2116 (talk) 21:16, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I can't follow you at all I'm afraid. I made it clear a long time ago that there was no concrete proposal (or even a "rough" proposal as you originally wrote) until the one proposed in this section. It is absolute stupidity to "vote" for something and not know what you're voting for (read: Brexit). Now then, take you "bullpuckey" (whatever that is) and move on. This is a dreadful waste of time and resource, it's never going to happen, and your continued sniping is simply not a great look. The Rambling Man (talk) 10:25, 4 November 2018 (UTC)

your continued sniping is simply not a great look. That the irony in this sentence is lost on you is simply pathetic. I don't know why you're so hung up on this point. I didn't !vote above, when neither of the draft proposals had been written, and I voted once they were posted, as did you and everyone else. As you can clearly see, I merely discussed the topic before either of the proposals were posted, as did you and everyone else, and that was after the rough proposal by Flipandflopped started this thread. (1/2)

Moreover, comparing this to Brexit is absolutely ludicrous. This is a draft proposal, so the whole point is that we're approving a temporary change to see what would happen, and then we'd look at the results and decide whether to make the change permanent. (It's so weird that I have to explain this to you; it's almost as if you are the one who doesn't know what you're voting on and you're projecting that onto me.) Besides, Fuebaey's proposal is extremely clear, so I know exactly what would change if we adopted the proposal. Anyway, the gullibility of 52% of your compatriots and the utter incompetence of your government aside, I invite you to stop spouting your bullpuckey (your attempt to play innocent as to what term I actually mean by "bullpuckey" is cute, but is plainly a pretense) and move on; a discussion to close this section is now underway, so it appears you've successfully suppressed another worthy effort to fix ITN using your amplitude, not your arguments. (2/2) Davey2116 (talk) 04:18, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

You make it sound like BLP violations are OK as long as they're not in a highly visible article. Do you really think that way? If not, then it makes no difference what ITN does - the BLP violation is still in the article. If that is a concern to you, just delete it from the article and take anyone who reverts you to dispute resolution. Banedon (talk) 22:47, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm opposed in the strongest possible terms to removing the quality criterion. The purpose of ITN is to showcase quality encyclopaedia articles about encyclopaedic topics that are in the news, not to highlight BLP violations, sub-stubs and incoherent messes. Thryduulf (talk) 12:29, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm just as opposed to removing the significance criterion, but I don't oppose a trial. Banedon (talk) 01:45, 3 November 2018 (UTC)

Oppose for the reasons already stated. This is not a news ticker, and editorial judgement is required. 331dot (talk) 12:34, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
This is far too easily manipulable to get advertising onto the front page of Wikipedia, in a way that RD is not. —Cryptic 12:38, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Time to close?

I didn't want to just WP:BOLDly close this, without inviting @Flipandflopped: to consider that while made in good faith, this proposal is clearly doomed. The ITN regulars like bickering endlessly about what should be in the news, ignoring what is actually in the news -- and they'll make up all kinds of fantastic doom scenarios if they ever lost that power (while ignoring the overwhelming success from fixing WP:ITN/DC). This has been tried before, and has degenerated into the usual walls of text, and sarcastic back and forth. Time to let it go, I think. Maybe post over at WP:AN for an uninvolved closure? If anyone thinks it's too soon, go ahead and archive this subsection as "too soon" I won't take it personally. --LaserLegs (talk) 00:22, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

I agree with your view that it is time to close this as it's going nowhere and getting sarky. However as an ITN semi-regular I wish to point out that I don't like "bickering" over what is in the news and yet to see any refutation to any of the several explanations given about why this is different to RD. Thryduulf (talk) 01:18, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Stricken. --LaserLegs (talk) 01:40, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

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

(Closed) Stan Lee

Enough already, it's done. NONE of this bickering has ANYTHING to do with Stan Lee or ITN. If you think you can get it pulled, revert my closure, just please stop with the walls of text all of you. --LaserLegs (talk) 21:53, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

It had to do with the posting of Stan Lee at ITN. Sca (talk) 22:05, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

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

Post-posting and post-closing (closed by LaserLegs) comment:

Appropriate for RD only. Most Americans have never heard of subject, and I expect few other English-speaking readers have either. (However, contrary to TRM's comment (joke?), most Americans and other English-speakers certainly have heard of Stephen Hawking). Besides, the man was 95. – Sca (talk) 21:31, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Nope. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:35, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

"Systemic bias exemplified." – Sca (talk) 21:39, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Sca, did you remember the bit about "transformative"? It didn't matter that he was an old man/woman (like Mandela/Thatcher), he was transformative in his field. I know you don't like popular culture but I'm afraid you're in scant minority. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:38, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Au contraire. Here's an example. – Sca (talk) 21:48, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I don't watch German porn linked from Wikipedia, you'll need to do better than that. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:49, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Bollocks. Since when is Spiderman about systemic bias? Utter nonsense. Sometimes you make sense, but on this occasion, you are so far off the mark I can't trust your judgement any longer. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:44, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I was referring to your non-joking remark about Americans and Hawking – not to Stan Lee, Spiderman et al. Sca (talk) 21:50, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I suggest you try harder to make it more accessible. Right now this is just a waste of time. You normally count the bytes. Move on. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:51, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

'Transformative' in the realm of comics. Hawking was transformative in the realm of life in the universe. Sca (talk) 21:41, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Yep, and modern movie franchises, etc etc. You clearly aren't in step with what this project is about. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:44, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Even if it's true that people outside of America haven't heard of him,(I don't know if that is true or not) single-country objections are invalid at ITN. 331dot (talk) 21:44, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

331, please re-read my initial comment above. I didn't say outside the U.S., I said American and other English-speaking readers. By "subject" I meant Stan Lee. Sca (talk) 21:54, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

I'm Stan Lee!!! (UK) The Rambling Man (talk) 21:45, 12 November 2018 (UTC)
Reply I closed the nomination at ITN/C to prevent a battleground, it continued after closure, and now it's spilled over here. If you think you have a case to get it pulled and bumped down to RD then go for it. --LaserLegs (talk) 21:50, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

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

Brexit and ongoing news

Starting a section here for discussion on how to handle potential ITN items relating to Brexit and Second May ministry and Theresa May. The questions that may be worth addressing are whether Brexit should at some point be added to ongoing (the news on this has been dominating UK news for days and making headlines in EU papers as well with the publication of a draft agreement), and with potential headline news, e.g. Tory Party vote of confidence against May (i.e. Tory leadership election) or change of government, or new vote. The alternative would be to have nothing until the Brexit date in March 2019 (given that most of the rest of the world is really only interested in the end result). It all depends what actually happens, but it might be worth trying to form some consensus now about this. It is messy politics, but it is in the news a lot, so what are the key events that would justify an ITN/C nomination? I would say: actual change of PM and/or government, result of any new referendum, formal moment of any Brexit, and hardly anything else. Carcharoth (talk) 13:23, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

In my opinion, the only useful news in the short-term would be (a) May being up for replacement and/or (b) Parliament voting against the "deal" in December. If neither then March 2019's disaster can be posted. The Rambling Man (talk) 13:35, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

If the 48 letters are received by the 1922 Committee (as now seems very likely), the resulting vote of no confidence in May will be bigger news and will be likely, in turn, to precipitate yet another ruddy General Election. Martinevans123 (talk) 13:43, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

It is by no means certain that she would lose that vote (who would replace her?). Though Gove turning down the offer to be the new Brexit Secretary may indicate something there (rumours now that the department will be downgraded and disbanded as its 'job is done' - allegedly). May is very unlikely to get the existing deal through parliament. Sorry, too much discussion. Focus should be on ITN here. Agree with TRM above. Carcharoth (talk) 13:56, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

To me an obvious choice between a deranged chimp and Richard III. But you're right, it's all speculation at present. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:00, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

We just had a huge row on someone being called a "gorilla" on WP:DYK, and now you have to go and refer to an MP as a "deranged chimp"? For shame!!--WaltCip (talk) 13:53, 16 November 2018

OTOH, I always wondered what a Pfeffel was. Sca (talk) 15:07, 25 November 2018 (UTC)(UTC)

Key thing is that for posting, it should be some legitimate, tangible event, and not something that kicks off talking heads speculating left and right that fill the news but actually isn't news. Brexit is to UK news as Trump is to US news in terms of the volume of material generated that really is more just speculation rather than actual events to cover, so we should keep that in mind as Brexit date approaches. --Masem (t) 15:11, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

(.... as in "a toxic and divisive mix of reactionary nationalism and lack of proper thinking"?) But yes, I fully agree with that proposal. Martinevans123 (talk) 15:33, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Not so much in terms of why either topic is in the news, just that both topics appear to be the principle focus of both nation's media at the present time. Not meant to imply any ideological equivalency. --Masem (t) 15:39, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Yes, fine. At least Theresa isn't having to fire anyone, they're all quite happy to flee. Martinevans123 (talk) 15:46, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

Wait is how I would !vote at ITN/C until either the house of commons rejects the deal or rejects May. We're coming up on an important milestone. --LaserLegs (talk) 17:31, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

The Tory Party get to reject her, not the Commons, but only if there is a vote of no confidence and that vote then succeeds. There would then have to be a leadership election within the Tory Party. It would seem very unlikely that she would stand in such a contest. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:48, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

In my home and native land, a vote of no confidence is in the house of commons, it's not a party-only vote. My apologies if I was incorrect about the UK. Either way, the point still stands ... the time to post this is either when the EU+UK vote to endorse/reject the agreement, or if she's forced out and an election called (general or Tory leadership). --LaserLegs (talk) 20:45, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

No worries. It's hard enough for us Brits to understand why there has to be a race between elephants and donkeys across Armenia every 4 years! As far as the 1922 Committee is concerned, I'm afraid it will probably all end up as a bit of an ironic disaster. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:14, 15 November 2018 (UTC)

I'd likely support this for ongoing, to be honest. Heck, I'd even nominate it myself, if there was an obvious target article. Banedon (talk) 23:35, 15 November 2018 (UTC)
Then it would remain as Ongoing until the end of March 2019? Seriously? I don't think so. The Rambling Man (talk) 14:25, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

News just in..... The Gover is staying: [1]. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:34, 16 November 2018 (UTC)
Wait – The EU approved the deal in perfunctory fashion Nov. 25, but it would be prudent to wait until the key House of Commons vote in mid-December, then post the outcome at ITN. Ongoing doesn't seem appropriate at this late date. Sca (talk) 15:04, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

RD: Delayed reporting

Posted by Stephen. Thanks!—Bagumba (talk) 05:19, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

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

Willie Naulls died on Thursday 22 Nov, but it wasn't reported until Sun 25 Nov. I expanded and nominated the article (here), which currently has one !vote (support). I'd appreciate any additional feedback at the nomination (though it's probably got a small window even if gets posted). Thanks in advance.—Bagumba (talk) 03:46, 27 November 2018 (UTC)

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

ITNR and changes heads of state and government

There have been several recent proposals regarding ITNR and changes in head of state and government, all of which gained support but no consensus, principally regarding details. Let's take a step back and see if we can agree what we want and then, when there is consensus on that, work out the details (if needed) in a separate discussion. Please choose any combination of options that is not mutually exclusive.

In all cases if a single person qualifies in more than one category then there will be only one ITN entry. If an ITNR change in head of state ITNR and head of government occurs at the same time then there will be a single combined blurb.

Do not support or oppose an option just because there is no detail about how "most important" or "in day-to-day charge" will be determined - the whole point of this discussion is to separate the details from the principles. Details will come in a future discussion.

Section A: Elected heads of state

The following changes of elected heads of state should be ITNR:

All elected heads of state
No elected heads of state
Elected heads of state that are the de jure most important post in the country
Elected heads of state that are the de facto most important post in the country (regardless of de jure status)
Elected heads of state that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de jure only)
Elected heads of state that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de facto only)
Elected heads of state that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de facto and de jure)

* Directly elected heads of state only

4 and 6 seems these are the same thing --LaserLegs (talk) 22:07, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

Section B: Non-elected heads of state

The following changes of non-elected heads of state should be ITNR:

All non-elected heads of state
No non-elected heads of state
Non-elected heads of state that are the de jure most important post in the country
Non-elected heads of state that are the de facto most important post in the country (regardless of de jure status)
Non-elected heads of state that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de jure only)
Non-elected heads of state that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de facto only)
Non-elected heads of state that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de facto and de jure)

4 and 6 seems these are the same thing --LaserLegs (talk) 22:07, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

Section C: Elected heads of government

The following changes of elected heads of government should be ITNR:

All elected heads of government
No elected heads of government
Elected heads of government that are the de jure most important post in the country
Elected heads of government that are the de facto most important post in the country (regardless of de jure status)
Elected heads of government that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de jure only)
Elected heads of government that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de facto only)
Elected heads of government that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de facto and de jure)

* Directly elected heads of state only

4 and 6 seems these are the same thing --LaserLegs (talk) 22:07, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

Section D: Non-elected heads of government

The following changes of non-elected heads of government should be ITNR:

All non-elected heads of government
No non-elected heads of government
Non-elected heads of government that are the de jure most important post in the country
Non-elected heads of government that are the de facto most important post in the country (regardless of de jure status)
Non-elected heads of government that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de jure only)
Non-elected heads of government that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de facto only)
Non-elected heads of government that are in day-to-day charge of running the country (de facto and de jure)

4 and 6 seems these are the same thing --LaserLegs (talk) 22:07, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
- Not necessarily. If the person running the country day-to-day serves only at the whim of someone else that latter person may be regarded as the most important. (This applies in every section where you have made an identical comment). Thryduulf (talk) 12:21, 2 December 2018 (UTC)

Discussion about ITNR and changes heads of state and government

Do not support or oppose an option just because there is no detail about how "most important" or "in day-to-day charge" will be determined - the whole point of this discussion is to separate the details from the principles. Details will come in a future discussion. Please choose any combination that is not mutually exclusive. Thryduulf (talk) 21:51, 30 November 2018 (UTC)

Comment I stand by my earlier recommendation that we should just peg ourselves to List of current heads of state and government and ITN/R the green cell. --LaserLegs (talk) 22:07, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
Question: This issue seems to involve just "elected" heads of state. I don't think people will oppose a future King Charles III being posted. Is that right? Howard the Duck (talk) 23:30, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

More specifically the issue seems to be "ceremonial" heads of state, ones that have little actual power. In the case of the British monarch, they are also head of state of other countries, so a change in that position would likely be posted since it affects several countries. 331dot (talk) 23:35, 1 December 2018 (UTC)

Okay, the UK example would almost certainly be posted without ITNR. The same is true for the Irish president. How about, say, other European monarchies? Or would this involve non-European ceremonial heads of state such as the ones found in Singapore, for example? Howard the Duck (talk) 00:01, 2 December 2018 (UTC)

I'm not sure the Irish president would be posted without ITN/R as they don't play a significant role in running the country day-to-day. I think at least most European monarchies would be posted without ITN/R (although ones like Luxembourg are less certain and I'd be surprised if we posted the Bishop of Urgell (one of the co-princes of Andorra)), as would the Thai, Japanese and at least most of the Middle Eastern ones, but I'm uncertain about any others. Thryduulf (talk) 01:54, 2 December 2018 (UTC)

The Irish president will absolutely certain be posted with or without ITNR. Heck, we used to have the global sports of hurling and Gaelic football at ITNR at some point. Howard the Duck (talk) 09:52, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

Comment We can always WP:IAR and post Putin running Russia as the mayor of Vladivostok, or Prince Harry becoming the head of 35 states -- please let's not get hung up on the edge cases. --LaserLegs (talk) 02:24, 2 December 2018 (UTC)
- Nothing should ever be posted to ITN on the basis of IAR. Every entry needs to be nominated - this discussion is about which of these events are on the ITN/R list and so do not individually have to justify their importance at ITN/C. Any event may be nominated at ITN/C whether it is on this list or not. Thryduulf (talk) 12:23, 2 December 2018 (UTC)
  - I can't imagine a scenario where something would go into the template without going through ITN/C, but I CAN imagine one where we could WP:IAR our ITN rules and post whatever post Putin takes to circumvent the constitution next. Nevermind, I think I'm over this at this point. When Liz finally croaks, I'll do 35 noms for "head of state per ITN/R" and we can wander over to AN/I to deal with me. --LaserLegs (talk) 01:15, 3 December 2018 (UTC)
Most changes in head of government are posted as part of a general election(which doesn't seem to be at issue here) or when the head of state is also head of government(such as with the US). I think(and could be wrong) that the only ones that are not posted as ITNR are those that change due to internal party leadership changing(I think Australia did that recently) or appointed heads of government who are either puppet figures or just subservient to the head of state who appointed them. The heads of state are what seem to be the biggest issue here. 331dot (talk) 12:36, 2 December 2018 (UTC)

2018 Formula One World Championship

I'm relatively new here, so I have a question: The 2018 Formula One World Championship finished today, but I don't see any suggestion for posting it on the Main Page. I couldn't find anything the article's talk page or in the archives that indicates that this news was already posted. Can I suggest it? Thanks.--SirEdimon (talk) 18:04, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

I think it's covered by WP:INTR. 18:14, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

F1 championship is listed as a recurring item at WP:ITN/R so you should go ahead and nominate it yourself at WP:ITN/C. --Masem (t) 18:14, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Thanks.--SirEdimon (talk) 18:29, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

Lewis Hamilton's record did not get posted, did it? Martinevans123 (talk) 18:37, 25 November 2018 (UTC)

So what made-up record did Lewis break now? Howard the Duck (talk) 09:53, 3 December 2018 (UTC)

Wilmer Clemont Fields

Wilmer Clemont Fields is marked as ready but chronologically, can we even post it if there are other RDs already posted or marked as ready that came later?Zigzig20s (talk) 19:55, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

How many RDs can we post at the same time please? Many notable people die every week... Right now we have four RDs on the main page--I wonder if we could have a limit of 10 or more?Zigzig20s (talk) 19:58, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

User:Spencer: I will try a DYK but please read above, I wonder if we could be more generous in the number of RDs that we post?Zigzig20s (talk) 20:56, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

We would have to have 5 RDs posted to have Fields posted at this time. Expanding the number of RDs from 3 to 4 was proposed and discussed here, and it seemed like the consensus was that having four would keep the RDs in one line for most readers. I realize this isn't a very satisfactory article and you've done great work on the Fields article, but it is eligible for DYK. Spencer^T•C 21:07, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I've done a DYK for it...but why do we only want one line of RDs?Zigzig20s (talk) 21:54, 7 December 2018 (UTC)

The box is only so big, and has to balance with TFA. I'm sorry your article won't get any time in the RD box at ITN, but this is rarely a problem. --LaserLegs (talk) 21:51, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

It's OK, the DYK (if it doesn't get stale...) will get some time. I have a big screen, I could do with more RDs on the main page, but that's just me.Zigzig20s (talk) 21:53, 8 December 2018 (UTC)

Cleanup significance instructions

This is not an attempt to change the significance criteria I just want to clean up the mess at WP:ITN#Significance.

Proposed wording is as follows:

Whether a topic is significant enough for inclusion in ITN is often contentious, highly subjective, and ultimately each event is discussed on its own merits. The consensus among those discussing the event is all that is necessary to decide if an event is significant enough for posting. There are no rules or guidance beyond two:

The event can be described as "current", that is the event is appearing currently in news sources, and/or the event itself occurred within the time frame of ITN.

There is consensus to post the event.

Then remove everything else

Everything else there, all the suggestions, all the examples, the guidelines, none of it matters because it all contradicts the two rules, and those are the only two rules we stick to consistently anyway. If removing all the other noise leads to an unmanageable torrent of hopeless nominations (it won't) we can roll back. --LaserLegs (talk) 01:03, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

Support as nominator, obviously. --LaserLegs (talk) 01:03, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
A few thoughts:
- I'd prefer to keep something about discussing each event on its own merits.
- The bullet point about the frequency and size of updates is relevant to discussions about Ongoing - maybe it could/should be moved to its own section?
- The "Updated content" and "Article quality" sections could do with looking at as well as there is significant overlap in their current wording. Thryduulf (talk) 17:52, 9 December 2018 (UTC)

- A few responses:
  - It's still in there "and ultimately each event is discussed on its own merits"
  - I'm fine forklifting relevant parts to the "Ongoing" subsection, what do you have in mind?
  - Yes, they need to be merged and cleaned up. One thing at a time. --LaserLegs (talk) 01:13, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

What do you have to do around here to get a story posted?

The Ankara train collision has consensus to post, and has been ready to post for well over 24 hours. I know it is bad form to post a story that one has nominated, but if it isn't on the Main Page by 11:00 UTC, I will post it myself. I've already posted at WP:MPE without success. Mjroots (talk) 10:11, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

~~I suspect that's because of traditional weekend drop in admin activity from Friday to Sunday. The same goes for Wikipedia:Main Page/Errors where weekend issues may stay unanswered for days.~~ Brandmeister^talk 17:12, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Done this was already posted in Special:Diff/873830859, and lack of someone posting something isn't really something ERRORS should be fixing anyway. — xaosflux ^Talk 18:12, 15 December 2018 (UTC)

Neutral blurbs

The instructions don't say that blurbs need to be neutral. I thought that NPOV applied only to encyclopaedic content. And the idea of "neutral news" seems a contradiction in terms. But if we do want "neutral" blurbs, shouldn't this be added to the instructions? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 01:51, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

This whole website is supposed to be neutral in its point of view. It's one of the five pillars. Why do we need special instructions indicating blurbs should be neutral? 331dot (talk) 01:59, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

But the pillar says: "All articles must strive for verifiable accuracy, citing reliable, authoritative sources..." I've never assumed that it applied to other content like the user pages or talk pages. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 02:02, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

Why would we link to neutral articles on the main page of a global encyclopedia with non-neutral blurbs? 331dot (talk) 02:05, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

This is coming from the blatantly NPOV Syria blurb? I've been lurking around ITN for years and I doubt that happens more than once a year. The community acted swiftly and correctly to kill it. No need for instruction creep here. --LaserLegs (talk) 12:54, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
The ITN blurb is front-and-center on the main page and links directly to an article in the encyclopedia. Ergo, ITN is part of the encyclopedia, and it needs to follow its policy as such. End of story.--WaltCip (talk) 13:46, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
I am not saying it shouldn't be the case, I am suggesting that it be spelt out in the instructions, as it is for WP:DYK (criterion 4). Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:48, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

I share LaserLegs' concern about instruction creep and don't feel it is necessary to spell it out when everything is supposed to be neutral anyway. 331dot (talk) 23:08, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
Are there examples of non-neutral blurbs that have been posted? Calidum 23:43, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

This discussion flowed from the "Donald Trump betrayed the Kurds" proposed blurb on ITNC. I don't recall any posted blurbs that were that blatantly non-neutral. 331dot (talk) 23:48, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

In the process

Following the nomination of Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi for ITN, the article has been in the editing process but the nomination was closed by Tone. @Spencer: would you review the nomination again? Saff V. (talk) 08:13, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

It was another user that closed it. The reason was that the latest post on RD was younger than 26 December. --Tone 08:44, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Amos Oz

Amoz Oz finally appeared, a day later than could have been, and two days after public interest peeked. What can we do better next time? Will there be any credits, at least to the nominator? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:39, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

I just handed out the credits - I'm always happy to do that :) More admins working at ITN/C would be helpful. I think also there was an unusually high number of nominations over the last few days, which inevitably means some get overlooked. Look at Larry Eisenberg, which didn't get a single response.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 16:02, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

Holiday malaise I think, my guess anyway. --LaserLegs (talk) 19:12, 31 December 2018 (UTC)

And as of now Amos Oz, continues to be on the main page, inspite of other Recent deaths that were supported and yet went stale and were closed while waiting to be promoted to the main page. --DBig Xrayᗙ 11:59, 2 January 2019 (UTC)

Upcoming ITN/R suggestions (Oct–Dec)

This post attempts to highlight potential nominations that could be considered and where else to continue looking for news items. The recurring items list is a good place to start. Below is a provisional list of upcoming ITN/R events over the next few months. Note that some events may be announced earlier or later than scheduled, like the result of an election or the culmination of a sport season/tournament. Feel free to update these articles in advance and nominate them on the candidates page when they occur.

October

1 October: Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
2 October: Nobel Prize in Physics
3 October: Nobel Prize in Chemistry
5 October: Nobel Peace Prize
6 October:
7 October:
8 October: Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences
11 October: Soyuz MS-10
13 October: 2018 Super League Grand Final
14 October: Luxembourg general election, 2018
16 October: 2018 Man Booker Prize
18 October: Bhutanese National Assembly election, 2018
20 October:
- 2018 FIVB Volleyball Women's World Championship
- Afghan parliamentary election, 2018
25 October: Sakharov Prize
26 October: Irish presidential election, 2018
28 October: Georgian presidential election, 2018
31 October: 2018 World Series

November

Early November: 2018 Japan Series

6 November:

7 November:

18 November:

24 November: Bahraini general election, 2018

25 November:

28 November:

Late November:

December

10 December: Libyan general election, 2018

16 December: Malian parliamentary election, 2018

20 December:

23 December: Democratic Republic of the Congo general election, 2018

Late December: Bangladeshi general election, 2018

Other resources

Recent deaths can be found at Deaths in 2018
Upcoming elections can be found at National electoral calendar 2018
Upcoming solar eclipses can be found at List of solar eclipses in the 21st century
Upcoming space launches can be found at 2018 in spaceflight
New chemical elements can be found at Timeline of chemical element discoveries
News stories can be found at Portal:Current events

For those who don't take their daily dose of news from an encyclopedia, breaking news stories can also be found via news aggregators (e.g. Google News, Yahoo! News) or your preferred news outlet. Some news outlets employ paywalls after a few free articles, others are funded by advertisements - which tend not to like ad blockers, and a fair few are still free to access. Below is a small selection:

Newspapers

News agencies

Associated Press (AP)

Reuters

Agence France-Presse (AFP)

News services

Unlike the prose in the article, the reference doesn't necessarily need to be in English. Non-English news sources include, but are not limited to: Le Monde, Der Spiegel and El País. Which ironically are Western European examples (hi systemic bias). Any reliable African, Asian or South American non-English source that confirms an event took place can also be used.

Happy hunting. Fuebaey (talk) 22:34, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

Suggestion

There are more than seven billion people of the Earth today and hundreds of countries. It is a rich and wonderful place. There should be a mechanism in place to ensure the international news never reads as such: Death. Head of state. Death of head of state. Head of state. Death. Death. Death. Or maybe not... But think about this. A few decades ago people would have cried out to hear a few expletives on the TV because there was a certain kind of thrill to be had from that. Now that it is normalised, the people who would of got that thrill don't any more. But the only way to restore that thrill would be to oppress the people by blanket banning expletives again for a while and slowly reintroducing it after a couple of generations. Now, originally the moving picture news was all good news like pioneering sport and exploration. That all changed long ago but the only way to kill the thrill of good news is to have not one item of it, while reinstating that thrill takes not generations of oppression, but just being careful to make sure the whole list isn't, Death. Head of state. Death of head of state. Head of state. Death. Death. Etc. Why shouldn't there be a rule that at least one entry on any day is removed from either instances of destruction or the state of power? Note: "events of wide interest", "To point readers to subjects they might not have been looking for but nonetheless may interest them.", "To emphasize Wikipedia as a dynamic resource.", Yet currently the guide only suggests specifics about the significance of an individual article. These three quotes which draw half the raison deterre of the project but they cannot be satisfied without attention to the structure. A sort of positive discrimination. Or else the project page probably should be reworded a bit. ~ R.T.G 01:14, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

We cannot control how the news develops in the world. Same issue comes up when people ask about national bias or lack of such. We can't really do much about it. --Masem (t) 01:23, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Welcome to the wonderful world of ITN, where everyone knows something is wrong, but nobody can get consensus to make changes =) Banedon (talk) 02:41, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

The truth is there is many too many news items in the world to get any sort of broad coverage confined to the six. Here is some grandiose proposal from an uninvolved stranger, but it's at least a suggestion. You have six slots not one, that's a step. And you lack "good" news, but you have space for so much more beside too because ITN is merely the door even if we haven't got it figured out like that. Note, currently the only categories of news guaranteed to be pushed up the slots, and you have to admit this, is destruction and the state of power-at-the-top of any pile. So you have, Power, Destruction, Good News. And you have three slots after that unassigned. Now, it is not going to fly but in the perfect world, the next on the list would of been news for children, but that debate is out. We are not focused on children on WP as a long and fair story. But let's shoot, and the point in this suggestion is not my personal items on the list, but the structure of the list, my bullets on it would be like:-

The height of power/The breadth of power
Destruction or war whoever is winning, Disaster
Technology and science
Sport.
GOOD NEWS, and we don't mean the fireman rescued the cat which is great, but last week someone cured some kind of cancer or something and you all were like, oh but it was only a little bit of cancer, yet it is the littlest bits of it that cause your downfall, we all know all that. You can say you are focused on whatever you like, but Wikipedia is against bias, it is Wikipedian to make a law that says coverage is in the coverage no matter what you thought was shocking, just tear it all up like that, fear is so important, Good news is on the list.
Something. OR something else. A spice here. Something a reporter would like to see. An open slot which has to be filled with either crime or weather, (not just bad, bad, BADBADBAD weather, but...) or something. There is something there. Something about what we ~~erroneously~~ errosively call Nature. Entertainments and arts etc.

And that's just the ones that I would say. WPITN decided to become a portal a while back but the development was forgotten because the background has worked so well. NOTE: If this is your idea too or like your idea I know how to get it up here though obviously it will not fly for me on my way past. You form a cabal and you make a shadow copt of it in user space and you advertise it here, even if you are cut down by deletionists, once you think you own it, you put it on big letters on your userpage and you welcome every IP. If you build it... it will fill up itself eventually. Think about something you already know. When reporting confines th news to certain subjects it is broken. In fact it may be illegal in some places, not that they will hold WP to that but things are as they are. At least today it's not still all... oh... ~ R.T.G 23:15, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

Getting a feature on the front page of Wikipedia without being a Wikipedian is usually like getting a medal. The standards at FA project present themselves not as better than anyone else, but definitely as no worse. I mean they wrote that thing based on whatever was the best of standards in the world at the time. You can't turn a six item news run into a featured article partner, Mr RTG. But the thing IS, the Nobel Prize is based on categories, physics, peace, economics, chemistry, literature, and medicine. RTG, this is not a Nobel Prize around here, and the Nobel Prize is not a slow running six category news reporting service, now is it? It is only the top such news reporting service in the whole world of pre-internet information, and I still haven't heard of anything that beat it off that spot. I will be gone tomorrow proverbially. I'm just a nosey stick poker. But it's not true. I use WPITN news all the time when I have my head in the sand from the wider nonsense, and I may be crazy and typative, but I'm correct about what I am saying just not practiced at saying it. You can emulate the prize itself lads and ladies. If you build it, they'll fill it up. ~ R.T.G 08:28, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Numbers

Following events over the weekend where there has been disagreement over the use of 70/seventy (other numbers are available) on the template, can we please discuss the issue and come to a consensus?

We can all agree that if a number starts a sentence, it is written out in words. Where a number occurs within a sentence is where opinions differ. I tend to write out the numbers one to twenty, and use figures for 21 and above. Suggest this is adopted in future on the template. Mjroots (talk) 06:08, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

It has been commonplace to keep all numbers in the same format within the template as a whole, i.e. all blurbs have numbers as numerals, or all blurbs have numbers as words. Generally though, MOS should be followed, and "seventy" is fine, compliant with MOS and shouldn't be an issue under any circumstances (unless, of course, we're still trying to produce consistent-looking blurbs within the little corner of the main page that is ITN). There are those who just summarily reject MOS in favour of regular journalese, of course we don't do that because we have a style guide, just as those journalistic sources do. The Rambling Man (talk) 06:59, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

We have a style guide, just as those journalistic sources do – and all those ignorant journalistic sources – AP, BBC, Guardian, Reuters, NYT – are of course wrong, right? Sca (talk) 14:58, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

What are you talking about? I know your edits have been unusual lately, but honestly, it's becoming very difficult to determine what's a real post and what's a joke post. The Rambling Man (talk) 22:59, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

MOS:NUMERAL says integers between 0 and 9 must be written out and 100 and over are written in numerals. There is flexibility for anything in between. Suggest in the first instance that all numbers are written in compliance with the MOS and then, where possible, the flexibility is used to maintain consistency across all blurbs. I believe that this is current practice anyway - Dumelow (talk) 08:20, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

User:David Levy has explained the approach to consistency on occasion, perhaps he can summarise the logic here and we can codify it? Step hen 08:51, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Here's how we've generally handled comparable quantities (most often pertaining to people killed or injured) at ITN:

● If all numbers are greater than 9 and expressible in one or two words: use either format consistently (but avoid starting a sentence with a figure).

● If all numbers are greater than 9 and any are not expressible in one or two words: use figures consistently (but avoid starting a sentence with a figure).

● If any numbers are lower than 10 and all numbers are expressible in one or two words: use words consistently.

● If some numbers are lower than 10 and others are not expressible in one or two words:

■ If feasible, eliminate the issue through rewording (e.g., replacing "103" with "more than one hundred").

■ As a last resort, style all numbers – including those lower than 10 – as figures (but avoid starting a sentence with a figure). This is preferable to inconsistency or spelling out numbers in more than two words (which reduces clarity and introduces English variety issues).

As stated at MOS:NUMNOTES, various exceptions exist (though they don't typically arise at ITN) and incomparible quantities need not be styled consistently (and sometimes shouldn't be). —David Levy 17:41, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

@David Levy: By "comparable quantities" do you mean the five cats and thirty-two dogs, or 5 cats and 32 dogs rule at MOS:NUM? Because surely that does not apply to numbers spread across different sentences in different blurbs. I don't see why numbers in separate ITN blurbs must be consistent when their English variety or system of measurement or whatever else isn't consistent. Modulus12 (talk) 15:23, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Modulus12: Yes, I'm using the terminology from MOS:NUM.

"Must" is a strong word, but our longstanding practices reflect a consensus that such consistency is desirable. We also seek to use English variety-neutral language, but that isn't always feasible. Inconsistency with a subject's relevant English variety (or system of measurement) is regarded as worse than inconsistency with another item, but number formatting presents no equivalent issue. —David Levy 18:11, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Marvellous, thanks David, now that's sorted, please let's stop pissing about and focus on quality updates, not the recent surge of shambolic premature postings. The Rambling Man (talk) 23:03, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Emiliano Sala

What is the view on any nomination of Emiliano Sala for RD? Are there legal considerations here? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:04, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

It's likely to be opposed until it's confirmed he's dead. Banedon (talk) 22:42, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

Confirmed or declared dead, since they have called off the search. --Masem (t) 22:46, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

Yes. I was wondering if and when that was likely happen. Is there some kind of minimum legal period that applies? I'm assuming the Law of England and Wales is relevant here. But the supposed location was near the Channel Islands, so that's not entirely clear? Martinevans123 (talk) 22:48, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

I would assume that either officials or the team he was just signed on will make such a statement. We should not make the determination ourselves. --Masem (t) 23:27, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

That's the last thing I would ever suggest. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:30, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

I misread, sorry. I see what you were looking for (the time window when to start scouring for news stories). --Masem (t) 23:34, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

RD is appropriate whenever he is declared dead (assuming he is) and the day that declaration is made would count as the date of the story if it's more than 2-3 days after the date of his (presumed) death. If it doesn't look likely that a declaration will be made any time soon, then his disappearance could be nominated for a blurb (I have no idea whether it would get consensus or not). Thryduulf (talk) 18:52, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

I have some idea. —Cryptic 18:59, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Can a person be legally declared deceased by an inquest? Martinevans123 (talk) 20:34, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

See Declared death in absentia#Presumption of Death Act 2013. Thryduulf (talk) 21:26, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Many thanks. My reading of that article section is that an inquest is not necessary and that someone may apply directly to the High Court; although it doesn't actually say who may apply, or how soon, or how long it typically takes to get a ruling. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:35, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Looking at the text of the act anyone may apply (section 1(2)) but section 5 states: The court must refuse to hear an application under this section if— (a)the application is made by someone other than the missing person's spouse, civil partner, parent, child or sibling, and (b)the court considers that the applicant does not have a sufficient interest in the determination of the application. There appears to be no strict time limits, unless there is no evidence that the person has died in which case they must have been missing for 7 years or more and in all cases the applicant must give notice (the length of time for this is not specified in the act). The declaration only takes effect (section 3) after the time period for any appeals has elapsed or an appeal has been dismissed or withdrawn but the act does not say what that period is. Thryduulf (talk) 00:24, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Many thanks for explaining. Timescales do look rather uncertain. I suspect any decision will be largely ignored by he media, as it won't affect anything. It seems Sala was unmarried and had no children, so I'm not sure to whom his estate would pass. Martinevans123 (talk) 09:29, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

If he had a will, his estate will be distributed according to that. If not then I guess it will go to his close family - his parents if they are still alive and siblings if he has any. The timing will largely be controlled by these people. Given how much coverage this has got I'm almost certain that any declaration of death will be covered by the media (British and Argentinian), although how prominent will depend on how soon it happens. Thryduulf (talk) 11:03, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Yes, I think you are quite right. Although I'm not sure if Argentine law is relevant. The article doesn't tell us, but I imagine he's quite wealthy and is therefore likely to have a will. I guess we'll have to wait and see. But my point was really this - provided the article is sufficiently well-sourced (and it seems to be) would he expected to be posted at RD whenever his death was confirmed. Or is there some kind of time limit after which Wikipedia will deem him to be no longer in the news. I don't see how the official confirmation of his death will be a newsworthy event in itself. I was wondering if there had ever been any similar RD cases. Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:15, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Since there's a huge public backlash against the closure of the search, there's a good chance it (or a version of it) will re-start, perhaps independently financed. There won't be any announcement of his death for some time, but RD would still apply as and when that official announcement takes place, no different from other deaths which haven't been reported publicly for some time after the death itself. The Rambling Man (talk) 11:18, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification. I couldn't think of any similar recent RD cases. Even if any debris is found, I suspect the recovery of any bodies will be very unlikely. So the due process described above will probably still be required. But this is all WP:CRYSTAL of course. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:32, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

RD for members of groups and people who disappear

Based on the questions in the above section I've added a note to WP:ITNRD about people who disappear being eligible for an RD entry when they are declared dead in absentia. Unrelated to that, but to clarify another thing that comes up periodically is members of notable groups without an individual article are eligible for RD on a case by case basis. Please feel free to improve the wording or to discuss it further. Thryduulf (talk) 11:58, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Current events noticeboard

Template

Hello, on the template on the page here, there is a button that says "suggestions". When you click that link there is a list of nominations, but above that list the first section header is called "suggestions". Now, apparently that is not the place to leave suggestions for WPITN.. My words are confusing, but my point is, go to the page here of which this is the talk, and pretend you want to make a suggestion to WPITN, and see if you end up here where the suggestions go. ~ R.T.G 04:28, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

I think those are nominations for ITN (?) Banedon (talk) 04:58, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Ok Factbook ducment (talk) 20:02, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

(Closed) Football

The Superbowl is ITN/R, and for better or worse it gets an automatic pass. If you want to make a change, WT:ITNR is the place to do so. --LaserLegs (talk) 17:58, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

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

Do we absolutely have to post Super Bowl LIII? – Sca (talk) 14:09, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

As long as the article is up to scratch, yes. And there's really no good reason not to post. The Rambling Man (talk) 14:28, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

For what reason do you not want to post the Super Bowl, one of the top watched sporting events and a professional league championship? 331dot (talk) 14:29, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

The epitome of hype. Sca (talk) 15:34, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

Well not really, the epitome of a sporting event watched by spectators numbering into the hundreds of millions. It even reaches my shores. I think summarising it in totality as "hype" is completely fallacious. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:29, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

We post the Super Bowl not because it is one of the most hyped events or most watched events, but because it is the top championship event in a major sport. Gridiron football doesn't have the reach compared to association football or cricket to have multiple top level events, but it does have sufficient reach for at least the single top event. --Masem (t) 16:35, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

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

Venezuela

Per the comments on the RFC above, are people here keeping an eye on 2019 Venezuelan presidential crisis? I have attempted to keep the talk page manageable. And I have failed :/ No comment about the quality of the article, the sourcing, the edit warring, etc. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:44, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) SandyGeorgia, feel free to participate in the RfC by the way. I'm watching 2019 Venezuelan presidential crisis now. ―Matthew J. Long -Talk-^☖ 19:25, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

re: Emiliano Sala

I know this was a point of issue a few weeks ago, so we have news today the plane was found, at least one body in the wreckage. Officials say they will make a statement in next 24hr. [2]. In other words we're going to be able to post something about this soon. --Masem (t) 15:50, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

The previous discussion, now archived, was somewhat inconclusive. The decision to be made "in the next few days" will be whether to attempt to raise the wreckage. I suspect we will just follow the press if and when they announce that Sala is presumed dead. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:36, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Nomination for 2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides

@Stephen and Masem: Just FYI, I'm probably going to renominate 2010–2017 Toronto serial homicides ~~tomorrow (Weds Feb 6)~~ Friday, February 8, when Bruce McArthur~~'s sentencing hearing is scheduled to conclude~~ is to be sentenced. Doing more updating of the article now. – Reidgreg (talk) 16:32, 6 February 2019 (UTC)

RD: James Ingram

The article was ready to publish for over 12 hours and no admin posted it and now it was closed because it went on stale. But it only went on stale because no one posted it. I'm sorry to say that, but this is quite disrespectful with the editor (me) who worked a lot to fix the article issues. This is also quite discouraging. If I knew that all my work would be wasted I would never work on it.--SirEdimon (talk) 22:22, 3 February 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for your efforts. Sorry you feel it was wasted, but the article is in good shape and did get over 18k page views today. Please do not consider it wasted. The admins are volunteers with no particular schedule just like the rest of us. They just did not get to it. Richard-of-Earth (talk) 06:53, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

I've re-opened the discussion as the oldest RD of Ingvald Godal was recently corrected to 28 Jan, while Ingram died on 29.—Bagumba (talk) 08:55, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

In the end, it was published. I told "wasted" because I worked hard on the article expecting this to be in the RDs as Ingram was an important musician. But, of course, I know that an article in good shape is never a waste of time. I understand that the admins, like all of us, are volunteers, but I was upset by the fact that several admins passed through the ITN page and none of them published the article which was marked as "ready". But everything ended fine.--SirEdimon (talk) 01:55, 7 February 2019 (UTC)

Posting speed

I note that there are several instances where a story has had consensus to post for several hours before it has been added to the main page. To try and resolve this in future anyone should feel free to ping me once or leave me one talk page message if: (a) there is a story that has had clear consensus to post for around 2 or more hours and (b) I've been editing en.wp from this account within the past ~15-30 minutes. I can't guarantee that I'll respond to every single ping (it's not unusual for me to make an edit just before I go out or go to bed for example) nor say how quickly I will see the message, but hopefully other admins will make the same offer and/or talk page watchers will note there is a task needing to be done. If there are multiple entries needing posting then note this in the message rather than leaving multiple messages. Thryduulf (talk) 16:12, 15 February 2019 (UTC)

Yes, you can count me in on this as well. As long as there really is consensus to post, and you verify that first. Sometimes people mark a thing as [Ready] when it's anything but. — Amakuru (talk) 16:15, 15 February 2019 (UTC)

Change to the recent death order?

Would anyone support changing the order of recent deaths so that it is just a rolling list, rather than ordered by date of death? There's such a rapid turnover at the moment in this section that articles that are actively being worked on are going stale because of more-recent deaths. It feels to me that it is making it more difficult to get biographies onto RD that are reported a day or so late, need significant work, and/or are of minority interest, especially those from non-anglophone countries where it is harder for English-only speakers to check sources. We could revert to the requirement that the RDs should not be older than the oldest news item as a backstop. Espresso Addict (talk) 00:52, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

I would generally agree that it should be based on order that the admin adding it has determined the RD ready and posts it, rather than death date, so that each entry (generally) gets a bit of time at each position. Tricky would be making sure editors making this addition mark the RD on the date they post properly ( eg, adding the "Posted" w/ sig ) so we can track that in case there's any questions. --Masem (t) 00:56, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

I'd assumed we'd just use the hidden text field to put the posting date? (Do timestamped signatures even work in hidden text?) Espresso Addict (talk) 01:17, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

Oh, that part's easy. It's just in case there's questions what that date really should be. Easy to check when using the date of the RD nom, bit more difficult when using the posting date, though 99% of the time, the posting admin adds the posted notice. --Masem (t) 01:22, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

Support post order is fine for RD. --LaserLegs (talk) 01:02, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
Do you mean the current post order is fine for RD or the proposed "post order" would be fine for RD? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:58, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
There should be a buffer for this though --- we don't want very 'recent' deaths getting bumped off for say week old ones. — xaosflux ^Talk 02:09, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

Indeed. What do you suggest? The bunch I was concerned about being overlooked (Eckstein, Pilcher, Dewar) died on the 6th, but now I notice there's another worthy candidate who died on the 5th, but has only just been nominated. Espresso Addict (talk) 03:16, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

@Espresso Addict: as a general guide - perhaps 72 hours - now that doesn't fix what you just mentioned: as there are currently entries for the 7th, 7th, 7th, 6th -- should a more 'recent' death be bumped for the one on the 5th - at that point I think this is more of an editorial question: when it comes to that my personal guideline would be what is going to be the most useful for the most readers. — xaosflux ^Talk 03:47, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

I suppose I'm suggesting something more like 4 or even 5 days; but I wouldn't personally displace a Nobel prize winner for, say, a romance novelist. (There again, I'd personally consider Eigen to have been prematurely posted, as the article contains virtually nothing on his work beyond a list of topics.) Espresso Addict (talk) 04:25, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

User:Xaosflux When there aren't any suitable ready candidate to post then it is understandable that promoted articles linger on the main page for several days. But when there is a traffic jam of RD entries (like it is right now), we should actually look at the Fair share of main page exposure that these articles already got so far and replace them (entries from 7th in this case) to make way for promoting now ready but older RDs (i.e. entries from 5th or 6th Feb if they are ready). --DBig Xrayᗙ 07:13, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

Comment: Just as a case study, under current ordering we have John Dingell (d 7th; posted 16:39, 8 Feb) -- Frank Robinson (d 7th; posted 06:51, 8 February) -- Emiliano Sala (d rep 7th; posted 00:31, 8 Feb) -- Manfred Eigen (d 6th; posted 21:39, 8 Feb). So Eckstein/Pilcher/Dewar are competing with each other to displace Eigen which has been up for ~6 hrs, while Tomlinson was stale when nominated.

Under suggested ordering we would, I think, have Manfred Eigen (d 6th; posted 21:39, 8 Feb) - John Dingell (d 7th; posted 16:39, 8 Feb) - Frank Robinson (d 7th; posted 06:51, 8 February) - Emiliano Sala (d rep 7th; posted 00:31, 8 Feb). So Eckstein/Pilcher/Dewar/Tomlinson would displace Sala which has been up >24 hrs. Espresso Addict (talk) 04:25, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

Comment I think the current approach is just fine. What is particularly gratifying is the efforts now going into updating RD articles to get them ready for the main page, Wikipedia and the readers are truly benefitting from improved articles on the recently deceased. It will inevitably lead to the occasional article not quite making it in time, but I think usurping relatively current deaths (i.e. 24/48 hours) with those that happened potentially a week ago is not the way ahead. The Rambling Man (talk) 07:15, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
Support If there is a traffic jam of new contenders to this coveted 4 plots of RD real estate at the Mainpage, then I guess each should be allotted their fair share, even if it is delayed by a few days. The Rambling Man, the article Eckstein that I proposed died on 6 (3 days back and not a week old) The media coversage of his death only came in the last 48 hours, which is fairly recent. IMHO Eckstein still deserves to go on the talk page, It looks very unfair that an perfectly valid entry that was improved is being denied a posting only because there are more recent entries that have been posted already. Fairshare please. --DBig Xrayᗙ 09:48, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
I was't referring to any specific proposal. Fair sharing is fine, but not if lots of other more timely and worthy cases make better arguments for posting. The Rambling Man (talk) 14:49, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
Oppose I think this is just making things too complicated for little benefit. It's unfortunate if a particular person doesn't get as long on the MP as another, but nothing more than that. Why is displacing articles which were in good shape before the person's death with ones that weren't more fair than displacing older deaths with more recent ones? The point of the RD reform in 2016 was to get away from subjective discussions of who was more important so displacing a romance novelist rather than a nobel prize winner (for example) is something I very strongly oppose. If RD is moving too fast at times then we should consider expanding the number of slots. Thryduulf (talk) 12:59, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
Weak oppose Deaths in 2019 is still linked from ITN and a single click will take people to the articles; I also believe that most of the traffic to RD articles does not derive from the Main Page, but rather from search engines (although I don't have any evidence to back this up). I am strongly opposed to increasing the number of RDs posted beyond 4, because it would further clutter the section and force the RD list to 2 lines for most screens (I still believe that just 3 should be posted since 4 runs it to 2 lines too frequently, but consensus has already spoken in that regard). One potential solution would be waiting minimum 12 hours before posting a newly nominated article; there have been quite a few cases, especially recently, of prematurely posted RDs that were not of sufficient quality. Spencer^T•C 20:06, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
Oppose as nominated However, there's an augument for using the date the death was reported in the cases where there was a delay.—Bagumba (talk) 00:06, 10 February 2019 (UTC)
- Where the delay is more than "a few days" we do use the date the death was reported. There is no precise definition of "few" but last time it was discussed there was consensus that if the delay is 1-2 days then we should use the date of death, if it's 4-5 days or more then we use the date of reporting, but there was no consensus about 2-4 days. That's not to say that consensus wouldn't be different if discussed again though. I remember one occasion where we went with the date of widespread reporting for someone whose death was reported at the time but the news didn't make it beyond his home town until a few months later - unfortunately I'm hazy on the details but I'm pretty sure they were Russian and possibly a world war veteran or something like that; the mainstream reporting happened around this time of year but he'd died circa November the previous year. Maybe 2-3 years ago now? Thryduulf (talk) 13:20, 10 February 2019 (UTC)
  - Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates/September 2017#[Added, pulled, re-added] RD: Stanislav Petrov? —Cryptic 13:51, 10 February 2019 (UTC)
    - @Cryptic: Thank you, that is who I was thinking of. It seems I got the time of year completely wrong though! Thryduulf (talk) 14:43, 10 February 2019 (UTC)
  - I don't see why < 4 days needs to treated differently. Otherwise, these will likely be added as the 4th item and quickly be bumped off even when it is still fresh in the news, perhaps even moreso than some recent deaths.—Bagumba (talk) 15:07, 10 February 2019 (UTC)
Oppose I think the current system works fine. Posting based on the date of death and/or date when death becomes public is how we've always done it, and I don't see a strong reason to change that. --Jayron 32 14:37, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
An alternative suggestion- When the time comes to bump, we still bump the oldest, unless it has been up less than 24 hours. In the odd case all have been up less than 24, a second row can be added, or we bump the one that has been up the longest. ghost 15:13, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
Support in principle. I think anything that furthers our goal of WP:WORLDWIDE coverage is to be encouraged. I don't support cherry picking based on relative Notability (Nobel prize winner etc.) as suggested above, but I think if people néed a few days to get a subject from a less well covered area up to snuff, then they should get their time on the main page. The exact rules can be worked out, but this is a good proposal. — Amakuru (talk) 16:23, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
The problem with enabling some kind of rule based on subjectivity to reduce the lack of "less well covered" stuff is that's precisely why we moved to the current RD approach, i.e. everyone's death is equally notable unless you're blurbworthy, and that's 1 in 10,000 (unless you're an American actor/actress). We can't support a change to the order unless something concrete is proposed which doesn't sling us back a few years to determining why college basketball coach X is more significant than Ugandan human rights advocate Y. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:49, 15 February 2019 (UTC)

Lee Radziwiłł RD "stale"?

Is it right to close and delare the RD of Lee Radziwiłł (article) "stale" after only 24 hours? —Hugh (talk) 01:37, 18 February 2019 (UTC)

I'm sorry. The turnover on ITN/RD can be pretty high paced. The oldest current listed is Bruno Ganz who joined the Great Majority on Feb 16. That is the day after Lee Radziwiłł which makes her nomination stale. -Ad Orientem (talk) 01:45, 18 February 2019 (UTC)

AnomieBOT not working

No longer relevant, bot is working again. --DannyS712 (talk) 08:51, 18 February 2019 (UTC) (non-admin closure)

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

Hi. AnomieBOT's archiving task doesn't seem to be working - it didn't finish the last archiving, or do this one. I manually repaired / archived the discussions, and I'm going to put below the things I did so if I did it wrong please fix my mistakes (sorry) and if not we can replicate these steps until its back online. Thanks, --DannyS712 (talk) 07:34, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

Archiving

Open WP:ITN/C, go to the section for the day to be archived, edit the entire section, and copy the contents
Open the relevant archive page, currently Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates/February 2019, and edit the entire page
Find the inline html comment at the archive page reading "ADD NEW ARCHIVE HERE"
Paste the contents from ITN/C below the html comment, and remove the date's section from ITN/C

Adding a new date

Open WP:ITN/C, and edit the entire "Suggestions" section
Paste the contents below at the top of the suggestions section, replacing "16" with the new date (and February with the month, etc)
The contents are shown below, and are also available as an html comment for easy of copying (open this section in edit mode)
Find the previous day's section (in this example February 15), and remove the inline html comment "Insert new nominations below this line"

== February 16 ==

----

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