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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 24.23.245.41 (talk) at 19:21, 6 April 2011 (→why isn't there a way to link directly to the current TFA?: new section). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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thank you fa

for not having a 9/11 related article this year. 66.220.124.56 (talk) 05:23, 12 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Protection? What protection?

This might be a naive question, but can someone tell me what is the nature of the "protection" allegedly given to featured articles during the 24 hours in which they are TFA? I don't notice any protection at all - such article are assailed with mindless vandalism the moment they appear on the main page. Why is this permitted? Brianboulton (talk) 22:36, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

TFAs are "move-protected", which means during the 24 hours they're on the main page, they cannot be moved by anyone other than sysops. This is mainly to prevent vandalism, since page-move vandalism can cause extensive damage that needs to be cleaned up by an administrator. On the other hand, regular vandalism can be reverted in seconds by anybody, which is why they're usually not protected to editing. –Juliancolton | Talk 23:06, 23 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Regular vandalism may be reverted in seconds by anybody, but this is very time consuming. Also, sly vandalism can and does get through and can remain undetected. Why not give semi-protection from editing, so that for the 24 hours of TFA only registered editors can edit there? This must have been suggested before, so presumably someone thinks that the rights of IPs to vandalise must be preserved at all costs. Very odd. Brianboulton (talk) 00:14, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
It's been explained to me previously that we want to encourage new users to try out editing, and emphasize strongly the "anybody can edit" ethos to new users. One way this is done is to say "look, you can even edit the article on the main page." I've got some doubt how many good editors we bring in due to their ability to edit the TFA, but I can see how it's a good move politically. Kind of like the President of Kia Motors driving a Kia; sure, he'd rather drive something else, and no one is going to buy a Kia because he's driving one, but it would damage the brand if he drove something else (don't look that up, by the way, I completely made it up). As Julian says above, a large number of editors put the TFA on their watchlist, so vandalism is reverted much faster than on a normal page. All in all, like everything else around here, it's a compromise between competing desires, but it tends to come out all right in the end. --Floquenbeam (talk) 00:31, 24 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

October 13th FA

Just a suggestion, perhaps File:SmashBall.svg can be used for Super Smash Bros. Brawl while on the main page, similar to how File:Triforce.svg was used for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. The smash ball image is a free commons image and represents an in-game object that also appears in the game's logo. (Guyinblack25 talk 21:33, 5 October 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Occasional twin article(s) on mainpage suggestion

discuss here. Casliber (talk · contribs) 23:35, 1 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Re: Caversham, New Zealand

Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn!

As creator of this article, I was deliberately holding off on nomination of this for the front page until Otago Anniversary Day on March 23rd next year. It would have been nice if someone had given the main writers of the article some advanced warning that this had been nominated! Grutness...wha? 22:21, 29 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Could someone look at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/January 2010 and work out how to fix the link on the calendar that should lead back to the December 2009 TFA archive, but is taking people to the December 2010 one? And say here which template neede fixing, as I couldn't work it out. Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 07:15, 3 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A bot for talk page updates

There should be a bot making sure all WP:TFAs have their article history updated like this and this. I only check for WP:CHICAGO articles.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 23:08, 3 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I thought User:Gimmebot did that? ex. [1] —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 02:04, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
GimmeBot does, and already had in both of the cases listed above; I don't know why TonyTheTiger is adding maindate twice. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:14, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
You are not paying attention to what I am doing. Adding maindate does not provide the links in T:AH the way that I add it as an action. Look at the difference between what the bot is doing and what I am asking it to do. They are totally different things. Making the TFA an action provides a link for the page at the time of the main date like with any other action and also links the TFA blurb page.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 02:47, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
That seems like a lot of work just to add an oldid (GimmeBot already links to the blurb). I'm also not sure it's worth the work to add the oldid at the time the article goes TFA, since articles usually undergo improvement while on the main page. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:52, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It is certainly a lot of work to do it manually. Once a bot is set up it is nothing (As I understand bots to work). However, maybe the oldid should be from the conclusion of the TFA run. A bot could go back through all the TFAs that have been done "wrong" in this regard. Keep in mind it would both take care of the oldid and the TFA blurb page. These make the article history more robust.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:23, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The bot might have to do some work on old TFAs that have been FARed since TFA because it would have to insert an action in the sequence and shift subsequent actions down one, if this idea is approved.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:29, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Image in the upcoming TFA

I added an image of one of the globes to Wikipedia:Today's featured article/January 15, 2010. The image is a bit dark, so I was not sure how it looked (but thought it better than no image at all). Can someone clean up the image a bit? I did not move it here to protect it as I thought a better version might be forthcoming. Ruhrfisch ><>°° 17:12, 14 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Protected in any event. –Juliancolton | Talk 22:02, 14 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Too many computer games

Moved from Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

you post too many articles about computer games in the daily entry. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.103.228.4 (talk) 15:17, 31 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

WP:TFASTATS

For a bit of fun, and considering that Wife selling got over 300,000 views yesterday, I thought I'd propose a WP:TFASTATS page, in a similar vein to the WP:DYKSTATS page.

I've made a start at User:Parrot of Doom/WP:TFASTATS. Feel free to change the templates, add articles you're aware of, and rip the piss out of me for such a silly idea. Parrot of Doom 19:10, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have any objection, as long as people don't get all hot and bothered about it.--Wehwalt (talk) 19:33, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Don't like the idea. Counts on Wikipedia (WP:WBE, WP:DYKSTATS, WP:WBFAN, the wretched WP:WIKICUP, and so on…) are in general a fairly corrosive influence; they promote a "mine's bigger than yours" mentality while simultaneously feeding a drive towards the lowest common denominator. I can just about see a need for "most viewed pages" lists like this within projects, to give an idea of what the most urgent areas needing attention are, but I think that this would fuel an attitude of "Ceawlin of Wessex got 18k views while Flower (video game) the next day got 90k, so the public obviously want more videogames and less history, and we should give the people what they want". Besides, the Toolserver stats that tool uses are so glitchy (unless you actually think that Roman–Persian Wars got zero pageviews when it was TFA), that it's impossible to get meaningful figures from it. – iridescent 19:37, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Iridescent makes a good point. I have a compromise proposal - let's create the page, but set the minimum threshold fairly high (200+ hits) so that only a few articles per year get added. Raul654 (talk) 19:40, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think that would probably be a little on the high side. Over 100,000 hits is pretty rare, over 150,000 is exceedingly rare. I also think there's a problem of getting the message out that the page exists. Primary contributors and FA proposers will almost certainly be fully aware of the hits that "their" articles received when TFA'd, but few other people will be.
I'm aware that this page might also cause a minor push to making Wikipedia's front page a little more salacious; I'd like to nip that in the bud and say that I think you do a good job of mixing the front page up Raul, so I have no worries there. Parrot of Doom 19:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Are those numbers complete? I think you overlooked Barack Obama, which had 2.3 million on what I think was his TFA day. McCain probably had a ton too.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 21:32, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Nah, I know of no method of searching Wikipedia for these stats. I've added Obama and McCain, however. Parrot of Doom 22:02, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The fastest, most effecient way to do it would be with a bot run. Henrik would be the best person to ask. Raul654 (talk) 23:42, 2 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Are there stats for the least viewed main page FA's? I think that record will be smashed tomorrow. --Mkativerata (talk) 06:06, 3 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Ok I've asked Henrik to see if he can help. Meanwhile, if nobody minds, could someone who deals with WP or Wikipedia: pages move it to the correct location? I'm unsure if it should be WP:TFASTATS or Wikipedia:TFASTATS Parrot of Doom 13:23, 3 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thought

Might it avoid situations like this in future if the original FAC nominator of an article were advised when it was scheduled for the main page? That way, if an article were being saved for a forthcoming anniversary they could request Raul change the scheduling, and it would also put them on notice that the article's likely to be edited heavily and/or come under vandal attack. Presumably it wouldn't be too complicated for a bot to do. – iridescent 13:24, 8 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

RfC: Time to dispense with WP:NOPRO?

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.
Well, this was fun to read through, though not too horrible. The general consensus here seems to be that Today's Featured Article should be treated the same as any other article and be protected as warranted by the level of vandalism. While a small number of editors thought that WP:NOPRO was still valid, the vast majority here expressed the opinion that it was likely outdated and needed to be deprecated in favor of working under the regular protection policy. ···日本穣? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WikiProject Japan! 20:02, 9 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]


This is a request for comment on how we treat Today's Featured Article with regard to protection HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:03, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To elaborate, it seems that Wikipedia:Main Page featured article protection has become an outdated guideline with the increase in vandalism that Wikipedia as a whole and TFA in particular have seen. Featured articles are supposed to represent the very best quality work produced by Wikipedia's editors, and yet the one article featured on the Main Page is the most likely article to be found in a vandalised state, imparting false or no information to the reader. Often, the vandalism is such that it is back almost immediately after it is reverted. Yet editors do not request protection of the article, even when bots and automated tools cannot keep up with the level of vandalism because such requests are almost always declined by administrators who cite this guideline as their rationale. Indeed, it seems that this one guideline is given higher priority than core policies, including WP:BLP. For example, on the recently featured Kirsten Dunst (protection log), an administrator protected the article after a massive spate of vandalism including BLP issues, only to be reverted by another a few hours later, citing WP:NOPRO. The vandalism continued and the article was later re-protected. I'd like to put this to the community to decide:

Same as any other article of course. Aiken ♫ 01:15, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Does that mean you believe it should be always semi protected as soon as it goes live? —Soap— 01:16, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
No, I'd strongly oppose that. It should be treated like any other article- if the vandalism is beyond what can be easily coped with, then it should be protected, but the aim would still be to keep it unprotected as long as it's sensible to do so. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:25, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Well, it's true that vandalism on a currently live TFA gets reverted much more quickly than most any other article. I could agree with the words you write here while still believing the current policy is best because the definition of "easily coped with" is so flexible. —Soap— 01:30, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It is indeed flexible, but this discussion is about whether we should be treating TFA like any other article. We'd probably need another long, drawn out discussion to re-write the guideline (or write another one), though I'm open to suggestions. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:36, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I believe the current policy is good. Semi-protections of the TFA should be rare, brief, and only in response to unusual levels of vandalism. Minor vandalism is not a problem because the TFA is probably the most watched article on the wiki and people on Huggle can revert any bad edits within seconds. —Soap— 01:16, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Just noting that I havent been paying attention to this RfC and Im going to withdraw my vote because I dont really feel that strongly about it. Whatever happens is all the same to me. —Soap— 01:46, 4 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I believe the current policy is bad. TFA should be treated like any other article. If it gets vandalized more than a bit, consider some protection. The WP:NOPRO policy saying they should almost never be protected or semi protected is lame and out of touch with reality, although it does gibe with practice. Now, if we had working flagged revisions, that'd be a different story, we could let people edit to their hearts content. dispense with WP:NOPRO ++Lar: t/c 01:28, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Today's Featured Article should be semi-protected as long as it is on the main page. Other than providing mindless glee for the seemingly endless hordes of vandals and hours of preventable whack-a-mole for our diligent Huggle guardians, WP:NOPRO, while noble in spirit, serves no practical purpose that could not be served otherwise and better. Assuming that there is even one unregistered editor with a valuable contribution to make among the zillions of unregistered vandals, they would not be precluded from making it —at most — 24 hours later. Meanwhile we would preclude countless disruptions of the sort that would never be tolerated on even the least read article anywhere but the main page. --Nasty Housecat (talk) 01:40, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Per Lar, my first choice would be flagged revisions. My second choice is change the policy to 24 hour semi-protection. My third choice is treat it like any other article (but to be honest, if we treat it like every other article, that will basically end up the same as 24 hour semi-protection; I've never seen a TFA that wasn't vandalized more than it takes to get semi'd for 3 days at RFPP). It's a tradeoff, but as WP has matured, there are fewer and fewer people who don't know that you can edit a page, and more and more who are concerned about WP's quality. Improving WP's reputation for quality (FA's are the best we have to offer, and the TFA the most visible) is more important than hooking the 0.001% of new and good editors who will only try to join if they can edit the TFA. --Floquensock (talk) 01:42, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree with Nasty Housecat. TFAs are a huge vandal magnet, warranting semi-protection while the article is on the Main Page. Krakatoa (talk) 02:15, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • ALL Featured articles should be semi-protected while on the Main Page. If Wikipedia is ever going to get better credibility, then the featured article should be free of vandalism by IP editors. They should use the {{Editsemiprotected}} template on its talk page and someone will get to those requests PROMPTLY! Acps110 (talk • contribs) 02:42, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • When I read arguments against protecting articles that are on the Main Page, I imagine those arguments can be easily translated as, "I hold the principle of Anyone Can Edit so dear that I am willing to make other people clean up messes that could be easily avoided." Now, it's entirely possible that someone who holds this belief could watchlist every article linked from the Main Page and clean them up as vandalism occurs. But do these people stay awake 24 hours a day every day, or do they occasionally sleep, allowing others to clean up while they snooze? tl;dr: Articles that are linked from the Main Page should be semi-protected at the very least and fully-protected at best. NOPRO must go. Flopsy Mopsy and Cottonmouth (talk) 03:15, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • "and yet the one article featured on the Main Page is the most likely article to be found in a vandalised state, imparting false or no information to the reader." please show evidence that this claim is accurate. Resolute 03:16, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
For example: Today's Featured Article. Every TFA is like this. Many of them are much, much worse. How does this make the encyclopedia better? --Nasty Housecat (talk) 03:55, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think that shows 'yet the one article featured on the Main Page is the most likely article to be found in a vandalised state, imparting false or no information to the reader'. While I haven't done any analysis other then a brief glance, my glance tells me and I also strongly suspect any analysis will show that most of the time (i.e. over 50%) the article is in a relatively unvandalised state i.e. the total amount of time between vandalism and it being fixed is less then the amount of time between it being fixed and the next vandalism. This isn't an argument for not protecting the page, it's questionable for example whether having a page 20% of the time (random guess) vandalised is a good thing and there's also the issue of all the time spent by editors keeping it clean but as with Resolute, I find it unlikely that the claim is accurate and the evidence so far doesn't suggest it's the case.
Edit: Actually perhaps I read that wrong it seems to be suggesting that the TFA is more likely to be found vandalised then another article rather then the TFA is more likely to be found vandalised then not. But I still doubt it's correct. On some articles in some cases vandalism last for days, so it's questionable whether the TFA is more likely to be found vandalised then certain other articles (although the TFA may be more likely to be found vandalised then a random article).
Nil Einne (talk) 10:34, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I haven't analysed this since 2007, but I calculated then that the likelihood of seeing the TFA vandalised was 1 in 11, whereas the likelihood of seeing a random page vandalised is 1 in 920. However, as was pointed out then, random articles include both low and high traffic articles, whereas the average reader sees high traffic articles more often. I never found a way of calculating the likelihood of an average reader seeing a vandalised article. DrKiernan (talk) 11:59, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'd like to keep featured articles editable, so as to demonstrate the "anyone can edit" concept, but we must be realists - if we know these highly visible articles are going to get vandalised, the only sensible thing to do is semi-protect them. (After all, highly visible templates are fully protected, even with no particular expectation of vandalism.)--Kotniski (talk) 06:15, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Semi-protected while on the main page. Its a massive pain in the arse having to deal with the amount of vandalism some articles get. Wife selling was attacked mercilessly, thankfully that stopped once it was protected. Parrot of Doom 07:14, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think Wife selling is a great example, it was chosen as the April 1st article for a reason, and I doubt what happened to it can be considered representative of the general experience. Random89 20:57, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Alright then, what about The Dark Side of the Moon which was protected, or Mary Toft which suffered similar vandalism, or Gropecunt Lane...and these are just articles in which I have a heavy involvement. I suspect there are many more FA contributors who are similarly pissed off with what happens on TFA day. Right now, the liberty of idiot vandals seems to be placed higher than anything else. Parrot of Doom 22:28, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Kirsten Dunst, Miranda Otto... both BLPs, as well. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:31, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I freely admit that there are legitimate reasons to treat BLPs differently, and that perhaps NOPRO (or the guideline replacing it subsequent to this discussion?) should differentiate between BLPs and other articles. Parrot, I really mean no disrespect to you if you are one of the primary contributors to these articles, and a couple of them are among my favourite Tfa's of all time, but just like Wife selling, I don't think most article attract the same attention as Mary Toft or Gropecunt Lane. Random89 06:14, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I was the admin who unprotected Earth to start with, which rather kicked this whole thing off. I'm prefectly comfortable with that decision, because there were plenty of constructive IP edits, and the unconstructive ones (which really weren't that high for a TFA) were quickly dealt with. I generally support WP:NOPRO, though it would probably be sensible to try to tighten up the circumstances where protection is necessary for a TFA. GedUK  08:12, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • We have a policy to protect Featured Pictures (or at least we intend to - the number of reports made by Betacommand suggests we don't always do it immediately) to stop them being vandalised. Elen of the Roads (talk) 08:21, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I generally support the ideas that NOPRO tries to get across, although there are times when we should protect such as with BLPs and controversial topics. The problem is this is a game of balancing, as both options have their good points and bad points. We have to pick between losing one of our methods of attracting new editors in favour of improving the featured article for readers, or choosing to continue as we do now potentially gaining new contributors, but potentially losing new readers who visit the vandalised TFA and give up on Wikipedia before they have really used it. Perhaps it is time we did choose to protect the featured article when it is vandalised, and thought up new strategies to attract new editors? --Taelus (talk) 08:58, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
There's no evidence that leaving the page unprotected attracts new contributors to the project. The most recent analysis indicated that any new accounts created were detrimental. I would infer from those figures that leaving it unprotected attracts poor editors such as vandals to the project rather than content builders. DrKiernan (talk) 11:39, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Then it is especially true that we should revise our methods of attracting new editors if that is the case. But that is a topic for another RfC. --Taelus (talk) 11:48, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • We can't have it both ways. If TFA is a showcase for our best work, it should remain in showcase condition while on display. That means at least semi-protection (I would personally give full protection for 24 hours). If we insist on blind adherence to the "anyone can edit" mantra, we shouldn't maintain a showcase. My concern is to limit not only the mindless, malicious vandalism that attacks TFAs but also the well-meaning but inappropriate and often inaccurate add-ons which can be highly detrimental to the article's quality though sometimes hard to spot. Brianboulton (talk) 09:06, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support protection or at least semi-protection, leaving TFA unprotected is a net negative. Stifle (talk) 11:17, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support either automatic protection, or treating TFA as no different from any other article and protecting when the vandalism gets heavy. Wikipedia's reputation for inaccuracy exists for a reason; I can see no good reason why our most visible article at any given time should also be the one most likely to be showing a vandalized version. The whole "people will see it and realise they can edit Wikipedia!" argument is outdated; it may have been true when Wikipedia was starting out, but now the world and his dog knows what Wikipedia is and how it works, IMO the people turned off by seeing vandalism and inaccuracy outnumber the potential recruits. – iridescent 12:22, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • I just handled an OTRS ticket this week to the effect of "Did you know that anyone can edit Wikipedia articles? Are you sure that's a good idea?" I don't know how widespread that sentiment is, but there's still probably a large segment of the population that has never edited Wikipedia and for whom doing so would be a novel experience.--Chaser (talk) 15:08, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • Yes, but… I'm not saying there are no people left who don't know what Wikipedia is; I'm saying that among people likely to want to contribute to Wikipedia, the "didn't know anyone could edit" contingent are likely to be substantially outnumbered by the "why should I waste my time helping these people when even their most prominent articles are full of vandalism and edit-wars?" attitude. It's exactly the same reason I'd support the removal of ITN from the main page, which again highlights Wikipedia at its most unstable to casual visitors who aren't sure if this whole "open source" thing is a good idea or not. – iridescent 16:00, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support treating the TFA as any other article. Wikipedia is ever-changing, and even though the NOPRO essay/guideline worked for quite a while, it's to the point where we shouldn't leave the article open to being blanked and replaced with obscenities for hundreds of people to see. –Juliancolton | Talk 13:08, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I believe TFA should be treated like a regular article; just because it's on the main page doesn't mean it has special rights, although as soon as it is no longer on the main page, then unless the vandalism is severe, then it should be unprotected. We can't have vandals running around destroying articles. Narutolovehinata5 tccsdnew 13:13, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I like the idea of ditching WP:NOPRO and treating TFA like any other article. Automatic protection strikes me as overkill, since there will probably be a higher volume of requested edits for a high visibility page like TFA. Automatic semi-protection will be unnecessary at some points of the day. If NOPRO weren't a guideline, the protection policy would be enough for me to semi-protect during periods of heavy vandalism or when BLPs are featured.--Chaser (talk) 15:08, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support treating TFAs like any other article: if vandalism is high then semi-protect; however as it's such a prominent page, automatic semi-protection should be seriously considered, and I would support it. While an article may be improved while on the main page, more often than not it's a battle between vandals and watchers trying to maintain equilibrium. If an unregistered user wants to make a contribution, they're welcome to use the discussion page. Preventing vandalism on the TFA makes sense. It's one of the project's most prominent places and to leave it open to vandalism is counter-intuitive. Nev1 (talk) 15:54, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose automatic (and therefore mindless) semi-protection; strongly support WP:NOPRO as written; this is an attack on a straw man. Rather, we should consider whether The length of protection is as short as the situation reasonably permits should be installed elsewhere in protection polciy. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:01, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Meh I think the problem here has been exaggerated. Most of the time TFA has admins and vandal fighters actively watching it and vandalism is removed quickly. I agree with the underlying idea behind NOTPRO that we want things on the main page to be edit-able if at all possible in order to be welcoming to new users On the other hand I am also in favor of being tough on vandals. So I guess I think maybe just weakening NOTPRO a bit would be a good "middle road." The language could be altered to indicate that the bar for protecting is a little bit higher, and that the speed at which vandal edits are being reverted should be the main criteria as opposed to the volume of bad edits. Honestly though I think those who are campaigning to change this have little actual evidence to support their claims, just a few recent examples. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:04, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Yes, please do it. The TFA's are attacked mercilessly all of the time by vandals. It should be protected when the level of vandalism on the article become excessive, just like every other article. While I don't support semi-protecting it for the entire time, we should be more liberal in protection of the TFA than we are now. As for BLP's, we should be even more liberal in protecting those. I can just hear someone going "Uh oh, I'm gonna be featured on Wikipedia. What if I get labeled as a pedophile persistently?"... I would support semi-protection of BLP's for the entire time they're on the main page. The Thing // Talk // Contribs 18:26, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Anyone considering automatic (semi-)protection for the full 24 hours should go look at the main page. The most eye-catching words there are "Welcome to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit." (emphasis added). The principle that "anyone can edit" is part of the five pillars of this project. I agree that the volume of vandalism on the TFA is a problem, but blanket semi-protection for every TFA is the wrong default choice. Judicious use of temporary semi-protection makes far more sense. If we had a bot that dropped a note at ANI every day at 23:00 saying "Tomorrow's Featured Article is about to go live. Please watchlist it and semi-protect for an hour if vandalism warrants it" then I would surely follow that instruction. Targeted use of semi-protection during times of heavy vandalism would prevent most of it. Leaving the article editable during other times would keep the site inviting to more serious contributors. The best of both worlds.--Chaser (talk) 20:02, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, "anyone can edit" is one of the pillars, but it has never meant that anyone can edit anything at any time. Not just anyone can edit, for example, the main page itself. Or Barack Obama. Or any of the many other things that are protected for very good reasons. None of those restrictions trample on "anyone can edit." Why would a protection on TFA? --Nasty Housecat (talk) 22:50, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I admit that there are times that TFA should have been protected, but due to NOPRO was not, however, I fear that getting rid of the guideline would most likely lead to it always being protected, which would be a very bad thing. The correct response is perhaps a slight re-wording of the guideline, not abolishing a system that for the most part works. Random89 20:51, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Could you please clarify in what way this would be "a very bad thing"? Nev1 (talk) 21:16, 23 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that was not very specific on my part, what I meant is that without NOPRO we would have editors insisting that every TFA (and perhaps even every article linked from the main page) should be protected, when it is in many (most?) cases more beneficial to leave it open to editing. Random89 06:19, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • At the very least, we should get rid of this guideline. Why do we have a policy that deals with only one article? Our current guidelines on protection should be able to handle vandalism on the featured article. Also, to all editors who support not semi-protecting, would you also support unprotecting the Main Page? If not, how is it any different? --TorriTorri(Talk to me!) 02:15, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support semi-protection. Especially if the article is vandalised. Aaroncrick TALK 02:29, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • TFA should be protected, WP:NOPRO was created in a very arbitrary way. TbhotchTalk C. 02:30, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose (knowing I will get pelted here and also knowing that I have briefly protected a couple of TFAs before) – Today's Featured Article is the gateway to most future Wikipedians, and it shows a level of trust to the rest of the world; it's a way of telling people out there that "Hey! Yeah you! You can edit this article!" Freely semi-protecting Today's Featured Article will tell the rest of the world that not everyone can edit Wikipedia, and I don't think that's the right message to send to them; not to mention, this would directly contradict that little slogan that sits right above Today's Featured Article, which I need not mention as everyone knows what that says. –MuZemike 02:45, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Is the tiny proportion of new editors who, A) make constructive edits and B) continue to be productive editors, worth so much that we allow the other 95% to totally trash what is supposed to be our very best work? The first part of that slogan includes the word "encyclopaedia". What's the point of allowing anyone to edit a trashed article that's of no use to anyone? What use (aside from the libel) is an article that says nothing more than X is gay or that Kirsten Dunst was born in the year 1260 etc. The guideline was written in 2005, times have changed since then- Wikipedia is much higher profile and, sadly, vandalism is much more common, which is why the MP itself and everything transcluded directly thereon is fully protected. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 03:14, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"is the gateway to most future Wikipedians" - that doesn't seem like a particularly likely assertion. Parrot of Doom 08:03, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. I'll join MuZemike in copping a pelting here, having thought about this over a few days. Vandalism of TFA is one of the idiosyncratic elements of en:wiki that makes it unique. The message "here is our best work; and you can edit it" is a powerful one. So powerful in my view that it would take extreme levels of vandalism to warrant its dilution. It is a message that says to the world of the project's confidence in the principles of open collaboration. There will be cases of extreme levels of vandalism, particularly for BLPs, where semi-protection is justified. So I support WP:NOTPRO although I think it should make specific mention of protection being justifed for BLP issues. --Mkativerata (talk) 03:17, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
So Main Page must be unprotected too. TbhotchTalk C. 03:19, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
What a silly comparison. There's a big difference between petty vandalism and the chaos of messing up the main page. --Mkativerata (talk) 03:20, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
No, there's no difference between Main Page unprotected (April 2007) and TFA, both are used like sandbox. TbhotchTalk C. 03:22, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree with the principles behind WP:NOPRO, as long it is applied with common sense. Some days, the main page FA is barely touched. Great, no problems there. Most days, vandalism will increase, but it's easily and swiftly dealt with. Claims that the articles are left trashed and neglected while on the main page are gross exaggerations. If the vandalism gets out of hand, then go ahead and protect the thing. I've had to protect plenty. But one of the things I love about this project is that open editing actually works—it doesn't always work perfectly, granted, but by all rights it ought to be bloody friggin' chaos. But somehow it works, even on the main page featured article. We should take advantage of every opportunity to showcase our open editing philosophy. It's a tradeoff, but in my opinion it's worth it. --Bongwarrior (talk) 08:02, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Suggestion - What about using Cluebot with more aggressive settings on TFAs? (Or even Featured Articles more generally.) Rd232 talk 19:54, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose If we automatically protect the featured article it would give the impression that we assume that vandalism will take place and also gives the impression that not everybody can edit Wikipedia. Instead is there any way that we can change Cluebot so it maybe patrols the featured articles more agressively like Rd232 suggests? I'll pop by Cluebots owners page and let them know of this discussion --5 albert square (talk) 20:41, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose any automatic protection of TFA (as some above suggested) which would be inherently preemptive and thus in total contravention with our open editing philosophy, and is specifically disallowed by the protection policy. Comparisons with the Main Page are of no relevance, it's not an article so different standards apply and you know it would be unworkable to unprotect the MP, readers wouldn't see any clean version. Vandalism on TFA can be high at times but it's nothing in comparison, and vandalism is quickly dealt with, TFAs being well monitored. There are very good reasons for this guideline, explained there, the most important being that the TFA is, indeed, the featured article, and (usually) the most visible on Wikipedia and we need to send the message that Wikipedia can be edited. Now there are occasions where I think it's still too much vandalism even for a TFA and maybe we should allow a bit more of protection, ie change extreme to very high. Thus I oppose demoting the guideline and treat TFA as any other article, but may support altering it slightly to allow a bit more protection when vandalism is very high. In addition, isn't there a template which returns the title of the current TFA ? It could help to even better monitor it. Cenarium (talk) 21:36, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would like to see TFA to be treated like any other article. Antonin Scalia was visited over 43,000 times on its day recently. Allowing me to estimate at least 30 people loaded the article every minute (higher during peak times of course). That means that about 60 people loaded today's featured article, the most visible element of our site, and saw that "sam likes boys lol" [2]. We should take a poll of current editors and see how many feel that they began editing because they noticed they could edit TFA. Jujutacular T · C 23:55, 24 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    I did.
  • As for the substance, I oppose getting rid of NOPRO because it describes how we should treat every article: protect when necessary, do not protect unless necessary, and for no longer than necessary. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:45, 25 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Frag nopro as out of touch with policy and practice. My own TFA horror story: Bone Wars on the main page. This is a low-traffic article, to which I am the only main contributor (still active, at least). Vandalism was coming faster than I or the bots could revert it, and no one else was helping. Since I had to log off soon, I semi-protected. Page protection was promptly reverted by an editor who didn't even bother to revert any of the resultant vandalism. Common sense should dictate page protection, not this "keeping up the illusion"-based rulebook. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk) 15:19, 25 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Query/suggestion I don't suppose it is possible to have some kind of TFA watchlist subscription? One where the watched page gets switched to TFA as the TFA gets changed. User A1 (talk) 15:31, 25 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • Yes. We could take advantage of sticky watchlists to do this via page moves. See [3]. An admin bot could be set up to do the page moves even with move protected TFAs. To get autoremoval from watchlists, you'd probably have to contact the developers.--Chaser (talk) 20:57, 25 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - TFA is so closely watched by anti-vandalism users that any case is removed nearly instantaneously. Leaving the TFA unprotected highlights our motto of "Anyone can edit," while not causing significant disruption. Mamyles (talk) 18:51, 25 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sure that those editors have better things to do than sit on the TFA reverting vandalism. Often there's only one person (sometimes me) sat on the history whacking the rollback button. They do that out of necessity, not because they enjoy it and if they didn't, the article would be ripped to shreds in hours if not minutes. If you don't think it's that bad, wait for next high-profile article and sit on the history from about 1pm UTC and see for yourself. Bear in mind I'm not advocating that every TFA should be protected, but we need to be more willing to do so when the vandalism gets extreme yet, for some reason, this guideline seems to override the protection policy. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:13, 25 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose - I think that the sentiment of NOPRO is too strong to lose and it doesn't say that a TFA can't ever be protected. I understand it can be a bit of burden to watch articles, but usually a project or editors have championed the articles and are willing to put in the time to clean the vandalism. TFA is a good idea for visitors to see what you get on Wikipedia, which is unprotected pages the majority of the time, even if that means a bit of vandalism. I know some feel otherwise, but I believe that seeing vandalism may even invite visitors to edit to clean it up as their first edit. I would also guess that some of test editors or vandals go on to become constructive editors, though perhaps not in the short-term. —Ost (talk) 13:29, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support I am anti-right-to-vandalize. This is a logical step. Spiesr (talk) 17:41, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Conditional support I understand both sides of the argument. On the one side we argue that everyone should be able to edit, and seeing that even a front page article is adaptable may be a good way to draw additional editors. On the other side this edit-ability means that we will be serving bad pages to our readers if we don't revert vandalism at once - something that cannot always be guaranteed. I agree with User:Jujutacular on this aspect; for every would-be editor we have a dozen others will see a vandalized page. Also keep in mind that FA's are extremely high quality article's which means that it is virtually certain that new contributers end up being reverted anyway, sometimes with a warning. Therefor i say - treat it as any other article. Our FA for today, United States Academic Decathlon, drew low amounts of vandalism and therefor didn't need protection at all. But some other days i can only sigh at the amount of vandalism a FA article has to endure. Excirial (Contact me,Contribs) 22:25, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose per MuZemike (below), although something about BLPs needs to be added to NOPRO. People, without new editors, this project will eventually grind to a halt. If leaving a TFA unprotected results in more editors, that's great, and we shouldn't change. I think people are smart enough to realize what is going on and reload the page if they see a vandalized revision. —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 05:03, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Today's Featured Article is the gateway to most future Wikipedians, and it shows a level of trust to the rest of the world; it's a way of telling people out there that "Hey! Yeah you! You can edit this article!" Freely semi-protecting Today's Featured Article will tell the rest of the world that not everyone can edit Wikipedia, and I don't think that's the right message to send to them; not to mention, this would directly contradict that little slogan that sits right above Today's Featured Article, which I need not mention as everyone knows what that says.

— MuZemike 02:45, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
Comment Where is the evidence that editing the TFA is a gateway for new editors? Parrot of Doom 07:20, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Wikipedia:VPD#Save_and_Publish_Features might be relevant: if there was a "save page as draft/test" button available to users (even if they can't edit the live page), it would still help them get the idea of editing. There's also now an edit request link in MediaWiki:Protectedpagetext. Ultimately, this is one of the more obvious uses for Flagged Revisions (if/when that happens). Rd232 talk 13:56, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I did not so long ago propose adding random Editing Tasks to the front page: a page for cleanup, a page for wikifying, etc. Wouldn't it make sense to present articles to editors that actually need work (with appropriate help/guidance), and semiprotect the Featured article? Rd232 talk 13:59, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Evidently, this proposal will fail again, which is regrettable. There is no empirical data to support the theory that new editors join the fold because they saw a TFA and decided to do a test edit on it. More likely, newbies read an article of particular interest to them and think, "Hey, I can add something good to that." On the other hand, there is clear evidence that a TFA is a vandalism magnet. See, for example, this log of more than 130 vandalism edits/reversions to a FA during the 24-hour period when it was on the March 28, 2008, Main Page as TFA. Consider how many more readers may be turned off to Wikipedia as a reliable online encyclopedia and conclude it's not to be taken seriously or worth their time, when they click on the day's Featured Article, only to see blatant vandalism.  JGHowes  talk 04:46, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Is there empirical data to support that readers see some vandalism and immediately write off Wikipedia? Removing NOPRO is not the only way to deal with this problem if it is the case that some readers are being turned off by vandals. Perhaps a link could be added on the Main Page pointing to the article's version before it was TFA or when the it achieved FA? —Ost (talk) 13:29, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Of course, but that doesn't mean that something can't be done to provide stable versions in the interim if people believe this to be an issue. If I'm not mistake, an talk pages should already note the version where the article reached FA. —Ost (talk) 20:30, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • That would indeed be a good use of flagged revs, since that's pretty much what it does, but I have to ask what the point would be of only showing a stable version as things are- how would that help attract new editors while reducing vandalism. Also, it would have to be fully protected because editing an old version of a page reverts all changes made since that version, so that would kind of defeat the point. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 20:46, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • You do have a point about editing a version; I forgot it is possible and that protection is not possible for versions. One could create a protected page specifically for TfA that mirrors the content of a stable version, but that is getting a bit more complex. However, I didn't propose only showing the stable version, I proposed adding a link to a stable version. That way if readers are so concerned with not seeing vandalism, they can go to the version of the article that has been deemed appropriate. I realize a stable version is available in history or the talk page, but new readers wouldn't know that they are there.—Ost (talk)
  • This sounds dismissive, for which I apologise, it's not meant to! I'm still not convinced it would make much difference- we'd still have vandals trashing the article, I'm not convinced it would help attract new editors (the supposed rationale for NOPRO) and the only difference would be that those who bother to click the second link will be guaranteed a non-vandalised version. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:15, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
it would make more sense to me in reverse: create a sort of "poor man's Flagged Revs" by having a sandboxed version of the TFA prominently linked from relevant places - most obviously, MediaWiki:Protectedpagetext can detect the current TFA and display a prominent custom message "you can't edit the live version right now, but you can edit a draft version of this page". Rd232 talk 11:55, 29 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm, this might be be a really good idea. I hope it doesn't get lost in this mass of text. Even if we had to do it manually, we could use page notices. —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 04:22, 1 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - I think that one of the most necessary things needed for Wikipdedia to surviven in the long run is the ability to recruit new users. One important part of this is that the first time they try (and this is likely to be the TFA), they succeed in doing an edit without any biting edit notices or edit filter warnings. Semi-protecting the TFA would interfere with the success of this edit. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 08:04, 29 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • People keep making this kind of point in this discussion. I don't see the evidence that it is drawing in editors who then stay and are constructive, but it does annoy readers and waste the resources of existing editors. And, because TFA protectors do tend to be in angry mode, i think some of these people do get bitten - not surprisingly. So I wonder if it is even a good experience for these newbies. I think this special policy for TFA needs to go. hamiltonstone (talk) 01:46, 10 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • Why not provide editing routes on the front page which are at least additional to, if not instead of, the TFA? See my remark above: basically, provide cleanup suggestions with simple instructions/help links. It would be constructive in itself, bring in more editors, and take heat away from TFA if TFA remains unprotected (or else be an arguably better substitute). Rd232 talk 11:52, 29 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • Everybody's saying that it attracts new editors. Aside from the hordes of vandals it also attracts, nobody has provided any evidence of this and, in my experience, seeing a vandalised TFA actually confuses a lot of people. See the diffs I posted right at the top or this one from Talk:Ba Cut, yesterday's TFA. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
        • "Everybody" on the other side is saying that the vandalism drives away readers. Is there any proof of this either? I can just as easily envision the anti-cynical scenario with new editors joining to clean up the vandalism. —Ost (talk) 20:46, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support This is one of the exceedingly rare cases where semi-protection should be the norm in articlespace. I would be interested in some data on the half-life of an unprotected TFA. How long has it been since we went 24 hours without protecting one? Protonk (talk) 04:29, 1 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Since yesterday. It almost always remains unprotected, except in unusual circumstances. --Bongwarrior (talk) 07:28, 1 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support semi-protection for TFA on the basis that while the article is the most likely to attract new editors, it is also the most likely to attract drive-by vandals. Consider that a newbie viewing TFA to find it full of 'I haxxored ur syte' and similar tripe may be put off WP moreso than one unable to edit the article. Here's another idea (bolded so that it's not lost in the sea of words, if that's bad form, just change it and let me know): add a notice alongside the standard 'you can't edit this article' explaining why. Something along the lines of 'this article is the most visible on WP today, and as such is protected from editing in order to maintain its integrity. However, there are {number} of other articles you can add to!'. Just my 2p. - Mobius Clock 15:08, 1 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose, the TFA is on several watchlists when it's on the Main Page, ClueBot and other anti-vandalism bots are in angry mode when dealing with the TFA and we could even tag every edit in #cvn-wp-en connect. The vandalism there is reverted within seconds, so there's no point in protecting yet more pages. --The Evil IP address (talk) 22:41, 1 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Within seconds? -> This edit was on the article over 40 minutes. TbhotchTalk C. 00:27, 2 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
This was in the lead of a main page article for around an hour and a half. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.168.148.116 (talk) 12:29, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Look this, another IP comment TbhotchTalk C. 05:12, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
      • In this case, more people should watch the article and probably all edits to it should be reported to the CVN channel. But semi-protecting the article won't help with this, because you don't fix the real problem here. It's not the non-autoconfirmed users, but the vandals. If I want to vandalize, then I can also just as easily make an account and wait some time. The Facebook security expert Max Kelly, who once worked for the FBI, said it quite nice recently: "There will always remain gasps, and by fixing gasps, we will create new ones. Attacks are no nature catastrophes, there are human behind them. If we know why they're motivated to attack us instead of playing with their Xbox, then we'll be able to make their life more complicated" (src). It's pretty much the same here with Wikipedia's vandalism. I mean, it's not that I can't understand the desire for this, but this really isn't the solution. Innocent users shouldn't be punished for what their fellow users did, and even if we went for this, it wouldn't fix the problem. --The Evil IP address (talk) 13:00, 3 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
If that is true, then why are any of these approximately 5000 articles semi-protected as we discuss? I think it is safe to assume that none of them are being vandalized right now. Many of these are important and of broad general interest. But no one argues that protecting them has deterred serious editors from contributing. The proposal is to treat TFA the same. --Nasty Housecat (talk) 19:48, 4 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Data point. Not that it proves anything, but as a useful example, today's TFA had about 70% of its content missing for half an hour. --Floquenbeam (talk) 12:46, 5 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support demoting NOPRO. At the very least TFA should be protected under the same circumstances that other articles are. Automatic semi-protection would probably be wise, but making a special effort to keep TFA unprotected is a net negative. The idea that lots of new editors are brought in by leaving it unprotected is an unproven and unlikely claim, while the frequent vandalism of TFA is an established fact. --RL0919 (talk) 21:19, 7 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support. Many more people read Wikipedia than edit it. The general public already knows you can edit Wikipedia, but often thinks it's unreliable. It's much better to have them see "Page protected" when trying to edit than "f*ck obama!!!!!" at the top of the page. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 01:35, 9 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support treating all articles the same, be they FA, DYK or ITN. It should be bourne in mind that the appearance of an article on the main page usually doesn't get it the level of traffic of our most popular articles - [4] - and the traffic it does get dies off quickly once it is no longer on the main page, while the popular articles continue to get the 20,000+ daily hits day after day. Popular articles are more likely to bring in new editors than FAs; articles on topics that people are interested in and search for themselves are those that will get their involvement. All articles that attract vandalism, regardless of how many hits they do or do not get, should be protected - and it doesn't matter that a bot or patroller will undo the vandalism within seconds, because the page a person clicks on will not get changed while it is being read, and it could be the vandalised version that existed for those few seconds between the vandalistic edit and the bot/patroller edit. Our most popular articles will be getting a page view per second, so if an incorrect edit exists for five seconds there will be five people reading that incorrect page, which though corrected on the live version, will still be in the vandalised version in the reader's browser cache. Multiply that by the number of vandalistic edits across the day, and there could be hundreds of people coming away from Wikipedia with a jaundiced view of our reliability. SilkTork *YES! 10:34, 9 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose Automatic semi/full protection of TFA as such a measure both contradicts the protection policy, and assumes that ALL new users/anons are vandals (which contradicts our assumption of good faith). Feinoha Talk, My master 19:08, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
    • It doesn't assume that at all, that would be ridiculous. What it is based on (it's not really an assumption, more of an opinion) is the view that the costs of unprotection outweigh the benefits. Rd232 talk 19:51, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I am for semi protection --Iankap99 (talk) 02:08, 10 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support, essentially agree with above comment in support by RL0919 (talk · contribs). -- Cirt (talk) 17:33, 13 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support treating TFA like any other article, and semi-protect/full protect as necessary. SlimVirgin talk contribs 06:25, 6 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong Support. WP:NOPRO is one of the silliest policies on Wikipedia. Every day, the featured article suffers a large amount of vandalism - much of it going unreverted for long periods - and usually gets protected anyway. We could save ourselves so much of the energy wasted on reverting these edits by just auto-protecting the TFA. User:King of Hearts put it best above: 'Many more people read Wikipedia than edit it.', and ' It's much better to have them see "Page protected" when trying to edit than "f*ck obama!!!!!"'. Robofish (talk) 11:44, 7 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: I'm on the side of the removers, get rid of it! My reasoning is that most days (but not all) the pages are common targets for vandalism and are brought up often manually on WP:RFPP after being reported by a concerned editor which after waiting for any admin to respond before having it protected. Why not just cut out the middle man and automatically Semi protect any main page article for 1-4 days (or at least untill a time when it's off the main page and away from public attention. The C of E. God Save The Queen! (talk) 21:00, 8 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I will also say that today's featured article (Halkett boat) has only been on the main page for about 7 hours (I'm guessing) and has alsready been hit by IP vandalism which means we have to go through the tedious process of an editor reporting it and waiting before it gets protected. By that time as more people see it and vandalise it the more annoying it is for people trying to read it and accertain fact from fiction. The C of E. God Save The Queen! (talk) 06:35, 9 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose per MuZemike. I think it is really important we are the encyclopedia anyone can edit and we are perceived to be that. Protecting the main page (or even semi protecting) sends the wrong signal. Hobit (talk) 02:13, 9 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The Main Page has been fully protected for several years and this RfC is about striking a balance between being an encyclopaedia (something that imparts information not tells the world that someone "is gay") and any moron being able to deface because he's bored/mentally retarded/other. Just look at the vandalism sustained on yesterdays TFA- even with the editnotice discussed below, that's the worst I've seen it for some time. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 02:21, 9 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Alternatives to TFA unprotection

Discussion moved to Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Alternatives_to_TFA_unprotection to get wider input and perhaps some momentum. Rd232 talk 01:37, 7 May 2010 (UTC)}}[reply]

The main reason given to keep TFA unprotected is to encourage visitors to experiment and get into editing. Yet it's agreed that we don't like having our best content mucked around with: we are, in a way, treating our best content as a sandbox. If we can come up with sufficiently good alternative ways to get visitors into editing, it would make sense to showcase our best content, and have a separate sandbox. So:

  1. Add a sort of "poor man's Flagged Revs" by having a sandboxed version of the TFA prominently linked from relevant places - most obviously, MediaWiki:Protectedpagetext can detect the current TFA and display a prominent custom message "you can't edit the live version right now, but you can edit a draft version of this page", when you click the Edit button and don't have permission to edit. Basically, create Wikipedia:TFAsandbox and at the beginning of each day, seed it with the day's TFA. Allow people to muck around at will, and provide a custom Sandbox editnotice which (a) actually helps first-timers and (b) points people to the Edit Request button now available on the Edit button of protected pages (only shown if you don't have the right to edit the page). This would work best in combination with 2.
  2. Change "view source" (which may sound techy and off-putting, and certainly isn't inviting) to "edit this page". "View source" is shown if you can't edit the page - so the status quo makes sense in a way. But you want to lead people into how easy it is to edit (just get an account, make a few edits, etc), give them some info and useful links - plus that tab now has an "edit request" button if you can't edit, so it makes less sense than it used to. Let's stop putting people off editing.
  3. Drawing on Wikipedia:Cleanup, create an additional "learn to edit" box below the Featured Picture box, with various categories of Editing Things To Do. Perhaps include current content RFCs too - people might spot a controversy of interest. Include some basic instructions on how to do stuff like copyediting, wikifying, and link to more detailed ones. Bottom line: the slogan is "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit." Yet the front page gives no indication of the different ways you might be able to contribute.

All of these are worth doing regardless of the TFA protection issue - but if they are done, the cost/benefit of keeping it unprotected would be quite different. Rd232 talk 14:25, 5 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with 100% of this. Simple, and if fully implemented, more inviting to potential new editors than an unprotected TFA. Well thought out, Rd232. --Floquenbeam (talk) 14:40, 5 May 2010 (UTC)\[reply]
I also agree. These are excellent suggestions. --Nasty Housecat (talk) 18:09, 5 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Discussion continues at Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Alternatives_to_TFA_unprotection. Rd232 talk 22:41, 7 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Possible middle ground

I'm not sure the general response to proposing that approach as an alternative to semi-protection will be that positive. I do see how it could work, but it depends on fine judgement - you don't want to block for editing tests. There's a reason there is a well-established gradient for warning about vandalism (cf WP:UTM). Also, if vandalism is coming from lots of IPs, rapid blocking may not help as much as you'd expect. However, the use of editnotices specifically for vandal-prone pages which might be otherwise semi-protected is worth considering, at least in less high-pressure situations - the type of article that attracts school IPs for instance. This should be a standard template dropped in the editnotice (cf Category:Editnotice templates.) Rd232 talk 22:41, 7 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. I think it's worth a try- I normally watchlist the TFA so I could whack vandals as they appear, but obviously only for a few hours at a time. If we can get enough admins to watchlist every TFA, I think it might be worth trying. It seems to have worked on the election article- I was up til 4am, but I didn't have to protect it. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:59, 7 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Expanding on this, should we create a supplement to MediaWiki:Anoneditwarning as a template (eg Template:TFAeditnotice, which can be dropped in as the editnotice for the TFA)? Whatever happens, it can't do any harm, and since TFA protection doesn't seem to be happening, it seems worth a go. It doesn't have to have take HJ Mitchell's "you will be blocked" approach; just having a much more visible "why not play in the sandbox" and other help links could make a difference. Anoneditwarning isn't very attention-getting because it's permanent. TFAeditnotice can be bigger and more colourful in getting across the message "yes you really can edit this page - it really will be live if you click Save; but why not try the sandbox for testing". (PS one advantage of using a template is that it can test for the current date, so it can be live only on the specified TFA day, and can be set up well in advance.) Rd232 talk 11:16, 12 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good. The concern about having enough admins to watch it could be solved by a wide announcement of this on AN so that admins at AIV etc don't decline reports based on this editnotice. I also like the "why not play in the sandbox" approach. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 11:21, 12 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed, FWIW I agree with the original proposal, there seems no reason to have special rules for today's featured article. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:17, 25 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Template:TFA-editnotice

Well in the spirit being bold, I've gone ahead and created {{TFA-editnotice}}, and it can now be seen at today's TFA, Manitoba (log out for the full effect for the intended target audience). Comments? Rd232 talk 15:31, 12 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Freakin' awesome! Yeah! Whoo-hoo! Acps110 (talk • contribs) 16:33, 12 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I echo Acps. Nice work, Rd! —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 18:42, 12 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. It can certainly evolve from the start I made, but if it seems like a good enough starting point, maybe we can incorporate it into the TFA process, with appropriate instructions. An admin needs to edit the relevant article editnotices to include the template with the relevant dates; the template ensures this can be done well in advance as it's only shown on the specified date. Someone more familiar with TFA workings would have to do that. Rd232 talk 19:29, 12 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

An other possible proposal

Replace the standard wiki link on the main page with a permanent link to the last version before it becomes the TFA (a bot can do this); an admin may update the link to a subsequent good (i.e unvandalized) version. In this way, vandals won't affect what users see when they click on that link; and quite likely later vandals will revert earlier ones (assuming that the vandalism goes undetected). עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 15:06, 12 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hell No: You will get people who dont know they are viewing the previous revision, editing the previous revision and than overwriting all new revisions because of it. Basically any actually contributions for the day will get scrubed which is as useless as fully protecting the page. In fact, full protection would be better than this idea since people wont waste thier time doing edits that are just going to get over written. I feel allowing semi-protection just like any other page and a big edit notice will do.   «l| Promethean ™|l»  (talk) 04:54, 14 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I can't see any variation of this which would work; and I did try. NB for protection, an "edit notice" won't be much use! You mean what I've dubbed "can't edit" notices (Template:MediaWiki messages), which can display a custom message for the TFA. Rd232 talk 08:15, 14 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
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.

Why the obsession with Albertan 30's Politics?

I like stumbling over an obscure subject in the FA section as much as the next guy, but with today's FA on 1937 Social Credit backbenchers' revolt that makes what, 4-5 FA's covering basically the same subject... --85.165.252.165 (talk) 01:48, 7 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Just highlighting the project's strong areas of deep coverage, I guess, along with Vietnamese politics in the 1960s and Australian cricketers from the 1940s. As an aside, I can't recall enjoying reading a TFA as much as I enjoyed today's. --Mkativerata (talk) 21:26, 7 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
User:Steve Smith was on a one-man mission to FA just about everything related to Alberta politics. Fortunately for you, he's now an Arbcom member, so wont have as much time to do this. As is typical of politics, politics will slow the spread of politics. ;) Resolute 21:34, 7 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
If you want a different subject, we have something like 33 featured articles on battleships and battlecruisers. ;-) —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 15:05, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe. I am distressed at the recent lack of a Final Fantasy TFA, however. Are there any left that are eligible to put up on the main page? Resolute 19:48, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Screw Final Fantasy. Moar war articles! ;-) —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 19:52, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Combine the two? Lets get a FA up on Sid and the Airship! Resolute 19:52, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Better idea: let's conspire to overthrow Raul so we can feature only Final Fantasy and battleships on TFA. —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 19:56, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Only if we add hockey articles too. We might want to keep posting the Alberta politicians too... never hurts to stay in the good books of an Arbcom member.  ;) Resolute 21:23, 8 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've written ten FAs, all on Alberta provincial politics. Of these, four and a half are about the 1930s (Richard Gavin Reid, John Brownlee sex scandal, 1937 Social Credit backbenchers' revolt, Accurate News and Information Act, and half of Premiership of John Brownlee). For reasons I can't understand, four of the 1930s ones have been selected for TFA, while only one of the non-1930s ones (Ed Stelmach) has been. So while I think the reason that Alberta politics are overemphasized at TFA is because I spend so much time writing on them, why 1930s Alberta politics specifically are overrepresented might be better asked of Raul. Steve Smith (talk) 20:44, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Look, if you are tired of Alberta, IP, we can easily move east to Saskatchewan.--Wehwalt (talk) 20:52, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The Historian

Might I suggest File:Vlad Tepes 002.jpg as an image for The Historian? It is used in the article and is in the PD. Awadewit (talk) 00:03, 13 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Solar system glut?

Is there a reason for featuring Jupiter Trojan so soon after rings of Neptune (19 May)? Espresso Addict (talk) 00:21, 27 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I would ask Raul654. He schedules them.--Chaser (talk) 00:52, 27 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
No particular reason. Raul654 (talk) 00:57, 27 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Postponing Mary Rose

I was just made aware of that Mary Rose has been scheduled for mainpage featuring tomorrow. While I would certainly be very happy to see it on the mainpage earlier than expected, I would still like to request for its postponement until July 19, the anniversary of the sinking. I believe that it's much more appropriate to focus on the single most eventful date in the ship's history. Another important reason is that I've had a very fruitful collaboration with the Mary Rose Trust to release many unique, high-quality photos on free licenses, and I believe that this donation (see here for media attention) will attract more attention if its featured on the sinking date, something that I believe will also lead to increased goodwill towards Wikipedia.

Peter Isotalo 14:14, 7 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Given the urgency I suggest you notify User:raul654 on his talkpage as well (in fact I will do it myself), otherwise it might be too late to do anything about it. Yoenit (talk) 14:27, 7 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

TFA title

FYI, there's now a bot-updated template which returns the title of the current TFA, Template:TFA title. It is used to automatically display the TFA editnotice. You can use if for example to immediately access the different links related to the current TFA, e.g. using {{la}}: 1984–85 Gillingham F.C. season (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views). Cenarium (talk) 14:27, 9 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ernest Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway has been moved to a pending changes article. Scheduled as TFA for June 25th. Are we running the pending changes trial on TFAs? If so, I might want to learn what to do in a hurry. Thanks. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 12:20, 22 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't kept up with Pending changes issues, but User:Risker might know. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 12:50, 22 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

TFA category representation

I gathered statistics on the representation of the various categories of featured articles at TFA. This is the data as of 23 July 2010:

A large graph comparing these values can be viewed here.

There are two obvious trends that I noticed: As the size of the category grows, the total number of articles which have been used for TFA increases, but the percentage decreases. I don't consider either of these trends to be problematic or even particularly interesting, but there are some exceptions to these trends that are worth thinking about. The Transport and Video gaming categories are represented significantly less than categories of comparable size. History is the most frequently represented category, despite there being other categories which are much larger, such as Sports and Warfare.

Why do you think these exceptions occur? The under-representation of categories may be related to the apparent abundance of very similar article titles within those categories. Transport has 10 articles which all begin with "New York State Route". Geology, geophysics and meteorology, which is represented less frequently than Religion despite having more articles, has 20 "Tropical Storm" articles and 37 "Hurricane articles". However, I don't see any such repetition within the Video gaming category.

Thoughts? Are these exceptions a problem? Or perhaps just a symptom of an underlying problem? If so, what can be done to correct them? --Cryptic C62 · Talk 03:27, 23 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see that there is a problem. Raul is trying to keep a balance. If a lot of video game articles are written, they can only be used so quickly. If you want your article to appear on the main page, go write it on food and drink, we're starved for such articles. But video games, hurricanes, warships, the competition is heavy. Personally, I write to my interests, with the result that if I write in a popular category, it tends to languish for a while before being used, but if I write about my own professional field of law, where there are very few articles that have not been TFA, Raul tends to grab them within weeks. It is important to remember that just because we have a lot of writers who like to write about Hurricanes in Nunavut or the Luxembourg Navy, readers's interests are not altered. Thanks for the stats, very interesting.--Wehwalt (talk) 11:33, 23 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
What Wehwalt said. I'd also add that because "History" is a catch-all category for articles that don't fit smoothly anywhere else, it covers a much broader ground than some of the more specialized categories, so "similarity" in TFAR terms doesn't necessarily arise despite the articles being listed in the same category at TFA. – iridescent 17:13, 19 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Hmmm, even though it is a waste of perfectly good vodka, I wonder how hard it would be to write a FA on the Caesar... Resolute 19:19, 19 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
That article should be deleted per WP:BEANS; Wikipedia should not be encouraging people to use fish as a mixer. Nev1 (talk) 20:15, 19 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Of that we are in complete agreement. Though I am impressed at how Motts managed to take something as vile as tomato juice and make it worse. Resolute 22:41, 20 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Tomorrow's image

I can't see the image at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/August 20, 2010, but can't find the problem. DrKiernan (talk) 13:18, 19 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It worked fine yesterday but not today, which leads me to believe that the server which generates the thumbnails is down. Raul654 (talk) 14:05, 19 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Right. Looks fine now. DrKiernan (talk) 14:46, 19 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Picture for tomorrow's FA?

Resolved
 – Posted to WP:ERRORS as the blurb is already on the main page and that was probably the better place in the beginning. --meshach (talk) 00:16, 15 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

For tomorrow's FA (The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind) there is currently no picture. Would this be an appropriate one? Is is a free image and displays the setting for the game. meshach (talk) 18:37, 14 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Notifications

While I realise that obviously no one owns any articles here, I'd like to suggest that major contributors are given some notification before Featured Articles that they have worked on are put on the main page, particularly when the articles have not been nominated for the placement but instead are chosen randomly. This is not only for the edification of the people who have worked on the article, but to ensure that people well versed in the subject matter have a chance to both copyedit the article beforehand and keep an eye on it during the day. I put a lot of work into Murray Maxwell and consider it one of the best examples of my work on Wikipedia, and so was rather surprised to find on my return from a foreign business trip without internet access that it had been on the main page during my absence. I would have liked to have had some advance warning so that I could have reviewed it first even if I wasn't able to see it on the main page on its chosen day. Regards--Jackyd101 (talk) 16:35, 20 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

While it is not a formal rule, if an article is nominated by someone who is not a major contributor, during the course of discussion, that question tends to be asked. For the most part, though, nominators use articles that they have played a significant part in. For articles that do not come through TFA/R, you might want to talk to Raul.--Wehwalt (talk) 16:38, 20 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Its happened again! Battle of Lissa is another of mine that I had no idea was coming up on the main page before it appeared. Who nominated this - I can't find any discussion about it anywhere? I assume that this won't prejudice it being nominated again for the 200th anniversary next year?--Jackyd101 (talk) 12:48, 17 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I'm afraid it will. A page can only be TFA once in its lifetime. Sorry, Matthewedwards :  Chat  17:31, 1 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

TFA Minnie Pwerle

The summary of this TFA, due to go up in 4½ hours is disputed at WP:ERRORS. The fathers of this woman's children are apparently irrelevent to her late (and successful) career of painting on canvass that is the subject of the article. Does anyone actually read these things before they go up? Physchim62 (talk) 19:29, 25 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If it comes through TFA/R, I at least skim it and look for obvious problems (copyvios are usually not obvious). However, this did not come through TFA/R.--Wehwalt (talk) 22:03, 25 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Today's FAs and automatic taxoboxes

There is an editor updating wikipedia taxoboxes to automatic taxoboxes. The editor will make multiple changes in the template at one time. The coding development is not going well, and I have had to revert a number of automatic taxoboxes in FAs to manual taxoboxes due to broken templates causing long lines of big red text to appear in the taxoboxes.

If an article is scheduled to go on the main page, it should have a fixed, not an automatic taxobox. See this also. --Kleopatra (talk) 18:36, 9 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Like a Rolling Stone photo

Would this photo be alright for the January 8 TFA? If so, could it be added? Many thanks, - I.M.S. (talk) 21:54, 3 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Anyone? It'd be nice to have a photo - would it be O.K. to add it? - I.M.S. (talk) 04:36, 6 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment a policy page

[5] I did find some information here, but I started the discussion there. --Kleopatra (talk) 15:09, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Everyone should install User:Anomie/linkclassifier.js

Hi all. Just dropping by to suggest that editors install the above script to their Monobook/Vector skin as appropriate. What is does is to highlight links to redirect pages, pages that are up for deletion and disambiguation pages by changing the colour of the displayed links from the standard blue. The last one is most useful, it identifies where a link does not go to the intended target and should be fixed before going up on the Main Page. I've sometimes caught these appearing on the main page and had to submit corrections at WP:ERRORS, this will help shortcut the process. I will be suggesting this to all editors involved in the FA and Main Page content processes. Regards. Zunaid 08:11, 14 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Excessive vandalism campaign on Today's featured articles. –MuZemike 22:10, 18 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Admin help on TFA

Could an admin change "third powerplant" on the Grand Coulee Dam TFA back to "Third Powerplant" x2. Capitalized is proper per the Bureau of Reclamation's official name. I wasn't online when someone brought it up in WP:ERRORS.--NortyNort (Holla) 10:51, 15 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Fixed.--NortyNort (Holla) 11:12, 15 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

New TFA statistics page

I have created a new TFA statistics page at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/Statistics‎ with the aim of identifying significant correlations. Please take a look and leave any comments at Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article/Statistics‎. Prioryman (talk) 02:34, 19 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

there are specialpages for 'random article' and 'random redirect', why not for TFA? 24.23.245.41 (talk) 19:21, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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