Talk:Archive:Article of the Week/Archive 1

Archive:Article of the Week

Current talk page

Archive 1

Temporarily delay Life?

Based on these comments by the editors voting on Life:

Chris Day (talk) 12:43, 8 August 2007 (CDT) (Subject to the article being reapproved. There are quite a few changes since the last approved version. Also we need to complete the external links and bibliography as part of that process); Supten Sarbadhikari --I would like to wait a week or two to follow-up on Chris and Supten's points. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 20:02, 19 August 2007 (CDT)

Do you think we should temporarily disqualify Life from the contest for August 21 because of these comments? Even if none of these editors voted, however, Life would still have 6 votes to Electoral College's (current) 5, and would win anyways, so by that logic Life should still be eligible this week.

We probably also should have an overall policy stating that votes are unconditional so we don't need to sort out whether or not to count them in situations like this. What do you guys think, both on what to do about Life this week and about this as a general policy?

Although I have voted for Life, I have also put a comment on the Draft/Talk page that the English is a hodge-podge of varieties and should be standardized into US English before being made Article of the Week. Can someone do that? --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 22:01, 19 August 2007 (CDT)

I just noticed this. I just thought that so many changes have been made since the last appproval that it needs to be critically proofed. I have not had time to read the changes yet. No one else has responded yet either. Since we had biology so recently I see no harm in holding off if we have other good candiidates. Chris Day (talk) 22:05, 19 August 2007 (CDT)

Sounds good. I'll change the page to reflect this. -- Carl Jantzen 23:17, 19 August 2007 (CDT)

Procedure for a tie

One thing I've noticed is that there is no clear procedure for what to do in case there are multiple articles with the same number of votes at the designated time. As written it seems that the first article in alphabetical order would be chosen, but that seems a little unfair. My suggestion is that whoever is moving the article to the front page should be allowed to choose among all the articles with the same number of votes. This would get rid of an alphabetical bias, and give the program administrators something more to do. On the other hand would this be giving the administrator too much power? This situation isn't likely to happen too often, but it is worth thinking about. --Carl Jantzen 09:53, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

I think to begin with it would be determined by number of specialist supporters. If this fails to break the deadlock, then I suggest number of supporters generally. If all else fails, I recommend picking one - say by alphabetical order - then guaranteeing that the other is Article of the Week next. So no further voting takes place on that article, and people nominate and support for two weeks later. I don't think deciding by which one was nominated first is a good idea because this says nothing about quality. John Stephenson 02:49, 10 August 2007 (CDT)

John, I think this is all sensible--please feel free to write it on the main pages. Unless anyone objects! Well, we just need a clear decision procedure. --Larry Sanger 02:53, 10 August 2007 (CDT)

Pity the article that starts with Z. I feel that in the event of a tie, the article with the most number of verified references should win. This would encourage editors to use more references in articles. Meg Ireland 18:42, 10 March 2008 (CDT)

What constitutes verified reference? Footnotes? A huge bibliography? This would also put shorter articles at a disadvantage - and it's quite possible to have a short, quality article that deserves mentioning on the front page. I definitely understand the spirit behind this suggestion, but I don't think it is practical. My understanding of the articles of the week is to not say article X is better than article Y, it's simply a method for choosing and highlighting some of our better articles and new additions. --Todd Coles 19:48, 10 March 2008 (CDT)

I understand what you're saying Todd, but in the event of a tie what makes an article starting with A, better than an article starting with Z? Meg Ireland 19:52, 10 March 2008 (CDT)

Well, to answer your question, absolutely nothing. :) "The Article of the Week is an article chosen by vote among Citizens as exemplifying various qualities we like to see in a Citizendium article." My interpretation is that the voting is simply a mechanism to determine which articles we display - not to be a judgment on article A being better than article Z, or vice versa. Alphabetical order is just a quick, simple process to pick one over the other. Let me ask you this, why is it important that the "better" article be selected first, when both will enjoy their time in the spotlight? --Todd Coles 20:34, 10 March 2008 (CDT)

The process selects only one winner though, besided which wouldn't the better article winning give an incentive for the not so good article to catch up? OTOH, should a not so good article be rewarded on the basis of its title name? I feel uncomfortable with that though I wouldn't lose any sleep over it. :) Meg Ireland 21:00, 10 March 2008 (CDT)

But can an article be judged better simply because it has more citations? Then we might be seeing citations for things like "the sky is blue" and "fire is hot". With the population of CZ being so small, and with an even smaller portion of that participating in the voting, I try to look at it as an honor that someone will notice and nominate something I've been a part of. As we grow larger we will probably need to look into changing how this is done. Just try to think of this as a friendly competition. :)

Of course, these are just my opinions on the matter. It would be interesting to hear what others think. --Todd Coles 21:22, 10 March 2008 (CDT)

Article of the Week Administrators

I noticed the little section at the bottom of the page calling for Administrators for the AotW. Since no one else had signed up and I've been looking for a little way to contribute to CZ in adition to authoring I figured I'd jot my name down.

It's still quite unclear what, exactly, an AotW administrator's duties are, except for posting the weekly selection on the front page. Maybe I'll be able to play a role in shaping the program, although it looks like the existing guidelines should work fine for now. -- Carl Jantzen 09:21, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

--

I'm going to apply to join up for the time being to help it get started - I'll probably hand over the reins come October when College starts and my access to a computer at a certain time cannot be guaranteed :( Only heed my volunteering if it is a more than one man job - I am in a very roundabout way saying 'If no-one else volunteers, pick me!' PS- Carl, sign your posts at the end for clarity purposes :) Denis Cavanagh 09:25, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Whoops! Fixed. -- Carl Jantzen 09:48, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Article of the Week

Larry, Citizendium, etc al,

In addition to "holding up an article to the limelight" to show how good it is, can we have basically the opposite? Should we have a "focus article" of the week that we can collaborate on? Eric M Gearhart 12:09, 25 July 2007 (CDT)

Why not have both? Wikipedia has a Collaboration of the Week for certain WikiProjects; we could have wiki-wide improvement drives. Sean Allen 12:48, 25 July 2007 (CDT) Whoops, I mis-read your post. I think it'd be a great idea to have a focus article. (: Sean Allen 12:50, 25 July 2007 (CDT)

Well, that's solving a different problem and therefore there might be a better solution. The problem the Article of the Week solves is putting something attractive on the front page and rewarding people for producing our best work. A "Collaboration of the Week" would evidently be aimed at getting people to, well, work on articles. I agree that encouraging, in various creative ways, people to work on articles is the best way to motivate them, but I don't immediately see why choosing just one article for people to work on will actually do much more than get some of them working on that article. So...? --Larry Sanger 13:00, 25 July 2007 (CDT)

Red links in the front page looks rather odd. Can we ensure that at least the portion of the article of the week that is showcased in the Mainpage does not contain those? Supten 23:06, 25 July 2007 (CDT)

They don't bother me so much, because they encourage people to write articles on those subjects. But if you want to remove those links, or if you feel strongly about them, let's remove them. --Larry Sanger 23:29, 25 July 2007 (CDT)

Vote

Notice, dear Citizens, the Biology article featured on the Main Page. This illustrates the concept of the Article of the Week. We'd like to find out if there's enough interest in this and also in a Contributors of the Week thingie. Alternatively, consider the Creation of the Week New Article of the Week. Sign with three tildes (~~~) and let us know!

Interested in Article of the Week?

Please sign below if you are interested in, at the very least, voting on articles of the week.

1. Larry Sanger
2. Matthew Cornell Woods, Jr.
3. Eric M Gearhart
4. Greg Woodhouse
5. Michael Underwood
6. Sean Allen
7. Chris Day (talk)
8. David E. Volk
9. Jochen Wendebaum
10. Anthony.Sebastian
11. Aleksander Stos
12. Andrew Fleisher
13. Ruth Ifcher
14. Stephen Ewen
15. Thomas Mandel
16. Todd Coles
17. James F. Perry
18. Supten
19. John Stephenson
20. Nereo Preto
21. Gareth Leng
22. Stephen Tapril
23. Greg Heuer
24. Andrew Staroscik
25. JeromeDelacroix
26. Ian Johnson
27. Steve Mount
28. Denis Cavanagh
29. Robert King
30. Meg Ireland

Interested in Contributors of the Week?

Please sign below if you are interested in, at the very least, nominating a Contributor of the Week or a New Contributor of the Week.

1. Larry Sanger
2. Eric M Gearhart
3. Matthew Cornell Woods, Jr.
4. Jochen Wendebaum
5. Stephen Ewen
6. Todd Coles
7. Supten
8. John Stephenson
9. JeromeDelacroix
10. Greg Woodhouse
11. Robert King
12. Drew R. Smith

New Article of the Week?

I moved this discussion to CZ Talk:New Article of the Week. Carl Jantzen 09:34, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Further comment

Feedback?

Well, what do you think of the rules here? --Larry Sanger 07:13, 30 July 2007 (CDT)

Everything appears to have worked well to me. --Todd Coles 14:27, 31 July 2007 (CDT)

Its working well - I think this is a good idea, its good to have something like this clearly expressed on the front page. Denis Cavanagh 09:10, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Clearing the votes

I agree with leaving the previous week's nominated, but unselected, articles on the voting template, but perhaps we should remove the votes from them to give people the opportunity to vote for a different article if they choose. I'd do it but don't want to overstep my bounds here. --Todd Coles 14:26, 31 July 2007 (CDT)

Well, until there's more interest in the Article of the Week concept, we should probably leave the votes there. Otherwise we might find that there are no votes for any nominees! --Larry Sanger 06:49, 2 August 2007 (CDT)

Perhaps we should place a link to the voting page near the current Article of the Week on the mainpage? It could be that a lot of people don't realize this is going on. --Todd Coles 08:06, 2 August 2007 (CDT)

Actually, the link is there :-) just click [ "about" ]. Aleksander Stos 11:32, 2 August 2007 (CDT)

I was thinking of something more prominent. I think part of the reason the Write-a-thon was so popular was because there was a big template plastered on the front page. Not that we need something that big, but perhaps a note saying "Vote here by Tuesday for the Article of the Week!" or something similar that will draw attention. --Todd Coles 14:56, 7 August 2007 (CDT)

Clarify:

Can one vote for more than one article of the week?  —Stephen Ewen (Talk) 14:53, 7 August 2007 (CDT)

Isn't it clear enough from the "voting" section? Aleksander Stos 15:53, 7 August 2007 (CDT)

I thought so.  —Stephen Ewen (Talk) 19:43, 7 August 2007 (CDT)

I see. Interestingly, my double vote has been spoted as "illegal" too (by another Citizendian). So let us make it more explicit. I added a little something but feel free to reword it as you like. Aleksander Stos 02:30, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Specialist supporters

I'm not sure its fair that an expert gets three votes, mainly because Its unfair to say, have a history expert vote for say, 'The Roman Empire' and get three votes but someone writes an article about 'Gordon Brown' but actually has a better article and loses because no politics expert is there to vote for it. What do you think? Denis Cavanagh 11:38, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Well, I fail to see how fairness comes into it, for the simple reason that there is no way to guarantee the slightest bit of fairness here in the first place. A much bigger problem, fairness-wise, than the one you cite is the problem that we do not exhaustively explore all possible candidates. What if someone happens not to notice a better article? That's "unfair," too, and more likely to happen than the situation you describe. But we do know that we want to encourage editors to give us their opinion, and their opinion should be worth more because they know more about their areas of expertise. --Larry Sanger 12:06, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Maybe one way we can ensure that one topic doesn't dominate the Article of the Week is through some kind of rule ensuring rotating subject matter. For example we could require that the article of the week must not belong to any of the same Workgroups as the previous week's article. This would take care of Denis's example above by ensuring that even if the History article wins one week another history article won't be eligible the next, so the Politics article stands a better chance. It would also ensure that Biology articles will make up no more than half of the articles of the week. -- Carl Jantzen 12:26, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

I don't really think we need to worry about which articles are "better" here. They are all good articles, hence their approved/near approved status. The way I view it, atleast, is that this is more of a showcase of what we've produced, and the voting process is just a friendly way of deciding which one gets put up each week. --Todd Coles 12:50, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

I agree there, Todd. --Larry Sanger 13:00, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Not that I have anything against Biology articles, but they seem to have the most active workgroup and I want to make sure articles from all topics gain this exposure. --Carl Jantzen 14:06, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Thats a good point there Todd, I suppose I was kinda looking from the angle that the 'best' article should go up, but its not really that relevant since all the articles here meet a high standard. Denis Cavanagh 14:56, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Empty template

Okay, I went ahead and commented it out. Sorry, but that extra row with the [[]] just bugs me. Anyone editing the file will still be able to see the empty template. Greg Woodhouse 18:25, 8 August 2007 (CDT)

Admin(ship)

Just letting you know that now I'm going back to College I won't be able to commit myself to the job. Todd and Carl will do a great job though :) Denis Cavanagh 11:27, 9 September 2007 (CDT)

Lack of usability of this page

For some reason, it is extremely difficult to add an article to this page. without destroying the formats. I have given up trying to do so. Can someone please fix this problem? --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 18:33, 14 September 2007 (CDT)

Well, unfortunately, you have to get the template just right. I've just added a blank template. I'll also put in a pointer saying, "Here's where to add new nominees." --Larry Sanger 18:37, 14 September 2007 (CDT)

Thanks, Larry: I got bad-tempered with it...--Martin Baldwin-Edwards 18:44, 14 September 2007 (CDT)

Needs updating!

Just wanted to say that... :-) --Larry Sanger 10:42, 19 September 2007 (CDT)

With no apparent effect! Is anyone allowed to update it? --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 20:12, 19 September 2007 (CDT)

Done. There was a tie - I decided to nod-through El Tio rather than Shakespeare when I discovered that the William article is apparently still 'developing' (status 2). Someone should change this if they think the article is nearing completion. John Stephenson 23:28, 20 September 2007 (CDT)

The rule for a tie is alphabetical order.--Martin Baldwin-Edwards 04:00, 21 September 2007 (CDT)

Anyone is allowed to update it. You might want to add your name to the list of admins if you do so. --Larry Sanger 11:24, 2 October 2007 (CDT)

Nominations

We'd get more nominations and interest in this if we were to announce the winners. May I have a volunteer to post an announcement about all newly chosen articles to Citizendium-L? --11:24, 2 October 2007 (CDT)

As this is so much easier than fiddling with the technicalities of updating the page, I will agree to do it. You want only Article of the Week, or also New Draft of the Week, Larry? --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 12:56, 2 October 2007 (CDT)

Excellent!

Why not both, at the same time, like on Thursday? --Larry Sanger 13:22, 2 October 2007 (CDT)

Will do. I will email you about subscription lists shortly, which may need a rethink...--Martin Baldwin-Edwards 13:24, 2 October 2007 (CDT)

Date of selection

I have changed the selection date back to Thursdays, so that it occurs at the same time as "New Draft of the Week" as it used to be. There seems little point in having two different times for the changeover, but if anyone has a reason for wanting that, change it back to Tuesdays. --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 06:44, 11 October 2007 (CDT)

Darft/Article of the week

Shouldn't the title on the main page be "Article of the week" instead of "Draft ..." this time? Alexander Wiebel 17:05, 8 February 2008 (CST)

Yes, just change it if you see this problem. Martin Baldwin-Edwards 17:49, 8 February 2008 (CST)

Non-user-friendly template nonsense

I have tried and failed to add an article. Something is wrong with the template instructions, which means that we will not have any nominations and this is now a waste of time. Can someone please fix it so that normal users can easily add articles? Martin Baldwin-Edwards 07:51, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

As you can see it worked for me ... can you describe the problem you encountered? Alexander Wiebel 07:57, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

If you're willing to change the page format around a bit, so that nominations are at the bottom, you can use a section=new/preload to partially automate adding new entries. See CZ:Proposals/New. J. Noel Chiappa 11:16, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

The re-arranged instructions now work, but I think it would be better to follow Noel's suggestion. Martin Baldwin-Edwards 13:51, 22 May 2008 (CDT)

Should the status be noted to the article?

Somewhat randomly finding this page, I was pleasantly to surprised that I had written one, but didn't know it. Should there be a routine note on the talk page, article page, or even a tab?

Howard C. Berkowitz 11:45, 30 May 2008 (CDT)

RULES

Please note that there are rules for the Article of the Week. In particular, note Rule 2: the article must be of status 0 or 1. At this time, there is one article here not of that status. If the article clearly is developed, then you should change its status to 1 before nominating it here. Martin Baldwin-Edwards 12:08, 15 July 2008 (CDT)

time for a new article of the week ?

Didn't we have the same article of the week on DNA for about 2 months? I think, it's time for change we can believe in. (Chunbum Park 19:14, 29 August 2008 (CDT))

Winner for March 18, 2009

It has come to my attention that I selected the wrong article this week. At the end of last week, there was a tie between Battle of the Ia Drang and Wisconsin v. Yoder, which according to tiebreaker rules, Wisconsin v. Yoder should have won this week. Therefore, it has a spot reserved on the mainpage for the week of March 18, 2009. --Todd Coles 12:46, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

In the event of a tie, the first one alpabetically is chosen, see discussion near the top of the page. Meg Ireland 00:04, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

This is correct. The rules for a tie also state the following: "The remaining winning articles are guaranteed this position in the following weeks, again in alphabetical order. No further voting would take place on these, which remain at the top of the table with notices to that effect." I interpret this to mean that since there was a tie in the previous week, no further voting would take place in regards Wisconsin v. Yoder. Since that article ended that week tied for the lead, it should have been placed as the article of the week this week, which I screwed up. Oliver Cromwell was not part of the equation at that time. --Todd Coles 02:13, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm still baffled by this!

If this is called Article of the Week, why do we have voting that extends for a flippin' month? Right now, under Current Nominees, it says that the voting will extend until June 21st! If that's the case, then how can we choose an article each and every week between now (May 14th, if my calendar and tired old eyes serve me well) and June 21th?

The same thing obtains, I believe at the New Draft of the Week -- the time period of the voting is *always* a month.

It sure is a puzzlement to these particular little gray cells! Hayford Peirce 22:02, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

I think this was not intended. I just changed the date to reflect a one week period. -- Alexander Wiebel 07:44, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

heading in milpa

Is maize and beans coming up as a separate heading simply because the others have more paragraphs in the lede? If so, should the display be restricted to the first paragraph or two of lede to avoid such oddities, if such limitation is possible?

It's really hard not to accept Milt as the specialist on Miltonia. Howard C. Berkowitz 09:25, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Daniel and I are in the middle of making some fairly major changes to the AOTW and NDOTW systems, which are under discussion at http://forum.citizendium.org/index.php/topic,2706.0.html.

This will hopefully be fixed soon... Caesar Schinas 09:38, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

(PS - I agree about Milt/Miltonia!)

Fixed. Caesar Schinas 10:39, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Dates of Votes

I notice that whilst the rules on both AOTW ant NDOTW state that four tildes should be used to vote, thus giving the date for each vote, this system is only used on AOTW whilst on NDOTW three tildes - name only - is always used.
I therefore have two questions:

1. Why does the date/time of the vote matter?
2. Why doesn't it matter for NDOTW?

Caesar Schinas 09:56, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

Transclusion of stuff into places down below by an Administrator

I hope you ain't looking at MOI to do any of that stuff! As a character in a fine spy thriller called One of Us Works for Them, says when he is being coerced to help some CIA-types break into a Soviet-run hotel in Germany and then open the Reds' safe deep in a sub-basement patrolled by armed guards, "I'd rather go over Niagara Falls in a gravy boat!" Hayford Peirce 23:15, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

I revised CZ:Article of the Week. Provided place for anyone to simply make nominations. Then the program Administrators will do the transclusions.

I just revised the CZ:Article of the Week to provide a place (and instructions) for any CZ author or editor to simply add the names of new nominees.

I did NOT make any revisions to the transcluded versions of the articles that were added by Daniel Mietchen, Caesar Chinas or myself. All I did was provide a new section where anyone can simply add new nominees without having to transclude them.

I also reworded some section headers (and relocated one section) to make clear that Administrators of the "Article of the Week" initiative would do the transclusions.

I did that because I felt many authors and editors would be reluctant to make nominations if they had to do the transclusion themselves.

Caesar, would you review what I have done in detail and make any changes you deem necessary? If what I have done is acceptable to everyone, I will also revise "CZ:New Draft of the Week" similarly. Milton Beychok 23:27, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

I saw the note about Ancient Celtic music asking a constable to transclude the approved article with the Ancient Celtic music/Draft being already transcluded. I was just going to copy from the draft to the article, but there were too many changes that were not approved in the draft version so I had to do the transcluding myself... you might want to check it. D. Matt Innis 00:29, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Matt, I don't think that Daniel Mietchen meant to include the Disambiguation box template (at the top) to be included in the transcluded version. Perhaps you should check with him. Other than that, it looks like you did what he wanted done. Milton Beychok 01:34, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

You're right, it wasn't in the Draft so I just took it out. D. Matt Innis 02:01, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Ancient Celtic music not linked from Welcome page

Also, adding in an image would be nice, and a space before the final onlyinclude. Thanks! --Daniel Mietchen 02:29, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Daniel, the article does not include its title in the introductory section ... so there really was nothing for me to link from the Welcome page ... and that is why I did not do so. In any event, the (read more ...) at the bottom of the transcluded material links back to the article.

I really don't undersand why a space is needed before the final onlyinclude.

As for an image, there was none in the transcluded section. It would have meant my selecting one of the images from further down in the article and transcluding it in at some point in the transcluded section. That strikes me as my re-formatting the article without consent/discussion with the author or authors. If you really feel it necessary, please go ahead and do the necessary transclusion.

The amount of work involved in the weekly change of the AOTW and NDOTW is not insignificant by any means. I am beginning to see why you declined doing it on a regular basis. Milton Beychok 03:12, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Since the article is approved, I couldn't do the changes there, and to have a quick solution, I did them here and here. That's just a temporary fix, we need a long-term solution for the approved articles.--Daniel Mietchen 20:40, 19 June 2009 (UTC)