Wikipedia talk:Collaboration of the week/Archive 4

This page contains old talk from September 30, 2004 to january 1 2005, archived from Wikipedia talk:Collaboration of the week (previously known as Wikipedia talk:Article of the week).

Announcing a new collaboration project...Gaming Collaboration of the week!
There have been a lot of new Collaborations of the week popping up for specific subjects (such as Magic Collaboration of the Week) so, following the trend, I've put together a page for gamers to work together to collaborate on various computer and video game articles. The page, Gaming Collaboration of the week, will run similarly to COTW, but will focus on articles pertaining to gaming. If you're interested in helping out, go ahead and introduce yourself in Gaming Collaboration of the week's talk page. Please post any comments/questions/etc. there too. Thanks a lot; I hope Gaming Collaboration of the week will lead to valuable contributions on Wikipedia! --pie4all88 21:41, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Too many COTWs?
With the new regional COTWs and topic COTWs (magic, gaming, TV) is the idea getting too stretched out or will it benefit more articles? violet/riga (t) 07:38, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)

This expansion is the best thing to have happened in a while, IMHO. The main COTW can tend to be a beauty contest so the other variants allow focus to fall on articles that would never make it here. The ultimate aim should be to have every major article listed on FA, no? Filiocht 07:46, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)
 * Raul's third law would seem to suggest that these new COTWs, by appealing to people with similiar interests, will probably be more successful than the main COTW. &rarr;Raul654 07:52, Oct 6, 2004 (UTC)
 * Having looked at some of the incredibly impressive changes by very few users on some of these mini-CotWs, I'd definitely say that it's looking like you're right. Sarge Baldy 08:03, Oct 6, 2004 (UTC)
 * Cyclone Tracy being a case in point. Filiocht 08:11, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)
 * Which I just promoted to featured article :) &rarr;Raul654 08:15, Oct 6, 2004 (UTC)

Looks like you people are suffering the same idea as the stub sorting. --[[User:AllyUnion|AllyUnion (talk)]] 06:09, 28 Nov 2004 (UTC)

fyi
I moved the collaboration of the week template to the talk page. This is information for editors, not readers. Pcb21| Pete 08:52, 8 Oct 2004 (UTC)
 * That action was probably not needed since any page starting with "Wikipedia:" is written to be read by WP editors. D AVODD  [[User_talk:Davodd|« TALK »]] 23:42, Oct 11, 2004 (UTC)
 * The collaborated-upon article is always in the main namespace, not the Wikipedia: namespace. Pcb21| Pete 07:01, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Congo Civil War
Over at Featured article candidates, the Congo Civil War nod is being shot down quickly. Anyone care to defend, further improve? -- user:zanimum

Fix-it part 2
I am spurred by user:zanimum's nomination of Congo Civil War to try to revive the earlier discussion of fix-its, for further rounds of collaboration needed to make an article feature-quality.

Here are a couple options, in which a previous CotW would become a new CotW, for further work:
 * Past CotW could be eligible for renomination as CotW again.
 * Every so often (maybe every other week or once a month) we could revisit either one of our better articles or one of the oldest.
 * Maurreen 05:33, 15 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * Well, following the previous discussion, I nominated Renaissance on WP:FAC as our best shot, but parts were weak so it failed. Afterwards, it was substantially restructured (parts were spun out to their own articles for good reasons) and is now not as good as it was.  Iranian Revolution is also quite good (I polished it a bit) but it still needs images before it is worth nominating.  Of the other past COTWs, nominating Congo Civil War was also a good idea, but the WP:FAC objections are valid.


 * I don't think re-nominating old COTW winners for COTW again would be very effective, and would distract from red link/stub test for eligibility. However, I think it would be a good idea to pick one of the previous COTWs each week to highlight alongside the current COTW (at the moment, we are highlighting the previous week's COTW, but this could be changed to cycle through the previous COTW from the very start - the last week's COTW is likely to be as good as COTW will get it, but picking a previous COTW would minimise the chances of "edit fatigue" and give it a second boost). -- ALoan (Talk) 11:03, 15 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * Actually, I was curious to ask what the "success" rate of CotW was. How many CotW articles become featured? --  user:zanimum


 * Two. At least two failed COTW candidates are now FAs. So not a very good hit rate, really. My own view is that a vote for an article should equate with a committment to work on that article if chosen. That way, the winner would be the article most people want to work on, not the one most people want to see someone else work on and COTW might have a better success rate. Filiocht 13:14, Oct 15, 2004 (UTC)


 * Indeed - sad but true. I've edited the  template to include situs inversus, the first AOTW, in the hope that it might get some more polishing (see above) with the intention that the previous COTW entry can be cycled through the list of previous COTW winners, one per week.  On the other hand, would it be better to pick the stronger candidates first? -- ALoan (Talk) 14:57, 15 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * I like ALoan's idea of cycling through the oldest CotW to highlight along the with current article. As he said, this avoids edit fatigue. I don't have a great attention span. Maurreen 16:11, 15 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * COTW's biggest flaw is that too many well-meaning people vote for complex "big issue" or "cause" articles. On some of these, people without graduate school-level training in those areas of study really have no chance of ever writing anything to a featured article standard. Adding insult to injury, many of those same well-meaning voters never bother to stick around to help actually write the thing. For example, 41 people voted for NAACP, then only 18 editors actually contributed to it. The ratio is similar for other recent issue-oriented COTWs: History of feminism: 45/21; Congo Civil War:48/21. Whereas article that are feasible, like Signature and Junk mail expire for not being hot-button issues. D AVODD  [[User_talk:Davodd|« TALK »]] 10:13, Oct 20, 2004 (UTC)


 * Well, everyone has some knowledge of "big issue" or "cause" articles, even if not education at a graduate level about them, and since they are all redlinks or stubs, anything at all is better than what was there already.


 * I try to contribute something to each COTW, even if only copyediting, importing information from another article page, or snippets gleaned from Google, and I (vainly) hope that everyone who votes would do the same. The balkanisation of COTW, with the many special interest COTW springing up, may help to bring people closer to the subject matter and encourage them to participate.


 * A proposal was floated a while ago to require voters to undertake to contribute to the chosen COTW (rather than, as seems to be the case at present, voting for someone else to contribute). The real problems with that, it seems to me, would be (i) enforcement (do you remove someone's ability to vote if they fail to contribute?) and (ii) tone (COTW is a focus for encouraging community effort: preventing people taking part, even if they only vote, sends out the wrong message). -- ALoan (Talk) 10:30, 20 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Pledging
What would you say about supplementing votes with pledging (to contribute)? I suggest to introduce it gradually. First couple of months use pledge counts to break vote ties and to collect statistics, whether it will make sense to give pledges larger weight. To prevent false pledges: If someone pledges and then skips, he may be awarded with a boo-star. Mikkalai 23:51, 20 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * Sounds like it could be worth trying out. Filiocht 09:58, Oct 21, 2004 (UTC)


 * Sure, why not give it a try? Shorne 11:46, 21 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * Hmm. 45 people voted for International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.  Of those, 5 have edited it so far.  Sheesh.  Come on, people.


 * Perhaps this pledging thing is not such a bad idea. -- ALoan (Talk) 12:01, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * My own view is provided that there is no punatitive element if people fail to keep the pledge, it can only help. And it should keep the COTW page a bit smaller. I know that I have been guilty of voting for articles because I felt someone ought to do something about them, but knowing that I couldn't. Just means I'm dumping work on someone else. Filiocht 12:09, Nov 3, 2004 (UTC)


 * I always try to help, even if just copyediting, even if I haven't voted. Sigh. -- ALoan (Talk) 12:24, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I always mean to, but.... Filiocht 12:37, Nov 3, 2004 (UTC)


 * Indeed, ditto, which is why I would oppose sanctions; however, pledging without sanctions is a bit toothless, no? -- ALoan (Talk) 13:15, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * Maybe an embarassment factor, then; some kind of tag to put on user talk pages saying something like:  Article name is now the collaboration of the week. As someone who pledged to help try to bring it up to Featured article standard on WP:COTW, you are now invited to to contribute to this article over the coming seven days.  I've been banging on about this committment to contribute idea for a while now and I do genuinely feel that it's the way to go. Filiocht 13:25, Nov 3, 2004 (UTC)

(back to the left) I rather like the tag idea, but who is going to put that tag on up to 45 user talk pages? -- ALoan (Talk) 14:09, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * I'd expect there might be fewer if it was a pledge and not a vote. Filiocht 14:12, Nov 3, 2004 (UTC)
 * Well, we could implement the tag idea now, and we could amend the COTW to say that a vote implies that the voter will contribute if the candidate is selected. -- ALoan (Talk) 15:12, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Didn't work with the CSB project. - Xed 18:30, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * Which aspect? Tagging user talk pages, or stating that voting implied intention to contribute? -- ALoan (Talk) 19:06, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * The pledging idea. tagging user pages hasn't been tried. - Xed 20:09, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * What, like The Scarlet Letter?  -Litefantastic 18:12, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Re the pledging idea - I think it would work well. Okay, voting would go down, but not by too much, and people who contributed just to fulfill their pledge could end up contributing majorly. Lets give it a try. J OHN C OLLISON [ Ludraman] 23:23, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I guess both are worth a try. Volunteers to tag voters pages on Sunday are welcome :)  Should we just require a vote to include an implied commitment to contribute, or add a further voting category of Pledge? -- ALoan (Talk) 11:10, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I think a vote is an implied pledge. I can do some tagging on Monday mornings but am away weekends. Filiocht 11:25, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)


 * I don't like this idea. Not at all, not at any level. People come and help if they can. If they decided they want to and change their minds later, or simply cannot, they simply cannot. People come in and out all the time, helping where they can, and then moving on. And what makes you think that embarassing people into working is going to make them produce good results? They work if they feel comfortable. You certainly aren't going to make any friends by doing this. -Litefantastic 18:12, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * Well, I've edited the main COTW page. I think adding a short message to each voter's page along the following lines should not be too offensive:


 * You voted for this week's Collaboration of the week. Please come and help [insert name here] become a featured article.


 * -- ALoan (Talk) 19:00, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * How about: they put it on their page if they want to, and it says:

''I voted for this week's Collaboration of the week. Please come and help [insert name here] become a featured article.''

That strikes me as being rather more democratic. -Litefantastic 01:14, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * Well, anyone can edit a user's talk page: I can see no issues with adding an entry like my paragraph above (I don't mean a template across the top of the page, just a normal comment on a user's talk page). That doesn't too aggressive, does it? -- ALoan (Talk) 10:01, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I still like my idea better, but that doesn't mean anything. I'm not opposed to drumming up support, but I think that there are going to be a certain number of people who just don't like the idea of someone else telling them they said they would do something. I can't say it's wrong, but how many times were you happy to see your bills come in the mail? -Litefantastic 15:06, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * Culture of Greece won this week (just got around to changing the directions, etc) - does anyone want to flag voters' user talk pages? (A list of voters is in the old article.) Here is a template: Template:COTWvoter to include thus:  . -- ALoan (Talk) 13:17, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * I've done the first 23, but now I have to stop. I may get back to this later, if nobody else can help. Filiocht 13:32, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)
 * All done now. Filiocht 14:13, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)

Please do not include the template but rather transclude (I hope this is the right term) it  to allow for updates/future weeks, etc.  Thanks. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:36, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Too Slow
An article can spend a month on this page (well, not this page; this is the talk page...you know what I mean) before it can actually be put under the torch. I think this is too long. One solution has been to create separate COTWs for different things, but I wonder if maybe we should have more than one page being worked on each week - to COTWs each week. What do you think? -Litefantastic 12:52, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * This was dicussed a couple of times before (see /Archive 3 and /Archive 1) - if I remember correctly, the consensus was that it would dilute the (rather minimal, it has to be said, at the moment) effort directed to the selected page. -- ALoan (Talk) 13:07, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * On the contrary: If someone doesn't know anything about one of the pages, he/she can just go work on the other. -Litefantastic 17:53, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * Well, they all remain on WP:COTW as candidates, until they are pruned, even if they are not the COTW. -- ALoan (Talk) 19:20, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

(returning to the margin) I've just been looking at Culture of Greece and I think that the publicising of this article has worked well so far in attracting editors. The key thing is to get the selection process down to not more than 4 weeks (I'd actually prefer three). I think that ALoan's changes should help us get there. Do not give up on this concept just yet, guys. Filiocht 15:35, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

COTW- a flawed concept?
It seems to me that the structure of the COTW may be fundamentally flawed. There is a rather arbitrary and extended voting process, which does not tend to produce enough significant collaboration to produce featured articles on the assembly line. For example, check out recent collaboration African Union, which is a couple of basic paragraphs and a few lists, well formatted certainly, and no doubt spell-and-grammar-checked by a thousand eyeballs, but not even mentioning Muammar al-Qaddafi, whose idea the whole thing was, a fact that might make some view the proposed aims of democracy and human rights in a little different light. Now I'm not criticizing the few substantial contributors to the article (or the African Union, for that matter, which despite its dubious visionary is an organization of great promise), but it does seem clear to me that this is not much more than an individual could do.

Why do we even have votes? By the time an article can win COTW, most supporters seem to either have forgotten about it or lost interest. Not to mention articles with many votes that can never be written because of one slow week in the lengthy voting process. Now we have just one COTW at a time, often on a subject which has a limited interest base. Let's just set up an open page of collaboration proposals which can sit there for a set one or two weeks while some random team of a handful of high interest contributors can collect around it. Best of all, we have instant satisfaction, and anyone can find a collaboration they can contribute to at any time. Let a thousand flowers bloom, and a couple of dozen collaborations a week flourish.--Pharos 15:14, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I agree that the the number of featured articles being produced is disappointing. African Union is a poor example, since it didn't get much interest, but even then it tripled in size.


 * We really need a process to take the results of COTW and turn them into featured-quality articles. It is possible - look at Academia and Siege, and Abbey Theatre and Attila the Hun became featured, in part, because of contributions while they were COTW candidates.  The more focussed COTWs (for example, WP:UKCOTW and WP:ICOTW seem to be generating better results).  It ought to be possible to get Astrophysics, Dinosaur, Iranian Revolution, and many others featured.


 * I think there are two problems: first, it takes so long for a COTW to be picked that voters lose interest; second, people vote for issue-based articles that they think should have a decent article and which someone else should write, rather than something that they know something about and can assist with. The "pledge" approach and tagging the voters' talk pages may help.


 * In any event, there is nothing to stop the random team of high interest contributors adding to articles while they sit on the list - indeed, I would encourage it. The point is, without COTW, I and many others would not have edited African Union at all, and the page before COTW was atrocious.  (PS - please add the Gaddafi info to African Union!) -- ALoan (Talk) 15:57, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * In fairness, Abbey Theatre's FA status had nothing to do with COTW, really. I listed it here and when I saw how few votes it was attracting, I went ahead and rewrote it in my personal sandbox. Another user copyedited it at my direct request and then I listed it on Peer Review, where it attracted no comment. I then listed it on WP:FAC and dealt with any comments that came up. Maybe it was just too specialised for COTW? Filiocht 10:46, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)


 * I sort of said the same thing above. My biggest beef is that it takes an annoyingly long time to pick an article. Does anyone have a better idea? Or maybe we should just disband this page and have a series of COTWs; one for each major branch of Wikipedia: Philosophy, Media, Math, Science, etc. The problem with this page is that not everyone who comes to it can actually help because they might not know anything about the page in question. With a page for each major heading, people would be able to work more in their fields. This is already starting to happen with the formation of the Literature, Magic, Gaming, etc COTW; I think having one big COTW is an effective but innefficient process. The breakup looks to me to be the best solution. -Litefantastic 17:58, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * Articles need to be selected after 2 weeks listing, not a day longer IMHO. Filiocht 10:46, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)


 * Well, we could always ignore the "n votes in m weeks" thing and just impose a hard cut-off of, say, 2, 3, or 4 weeks. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:23, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * Worth trying. The current system is too complex, IMHO. For articles nominated this week, the COTW is the one with the most votes in, say, 4 weeks time. The others leave the list? Filiocht 12:27, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)


 * One problem with that approach (discussed several times before in the talk archives somewhere) is that some articles can have almost 7 days more than others to get votes. -- ALoan (Talk) 12:52, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * How about the COTW is picked after three weeks, and the remaining three-week-old articles get to stay in the noms list for one extra week? Filiocht 13:01, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

I think any of these proposals would be a wise step, as the nomination time is (I think) not helping the output of this project. From what I've seen, the really successful ones need one or more driven people who are willing to write the meat of the article, and then others seem to feel more able to chip and add bits and pieces. At the moment, it takes so long that those people have probably lost interest. For example, I was the one who nominated African Union, and I'd probably have done my best to push that along, but by the time it came up (two or three months later), I was studying for exams.

As an example, for the Australian COTW, our first project, Cyclone Tracy, became a featured article very quickly. It stalled at first, and then two of us wrote most of the article - then others joined in and added bits and pieces. Since then, the two of us have been busy with other things, and no one has really been there to drive the individual projects along - and hence, very little work has occureed. Maybe we need some sort of requirement for a certain number of people to commit to getting started and getting the meat of the article together. Ambi 13:36, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I think we ought to hold fire with any radical changes for few weeks, to see whether the user talk page "tagging" has much effect (after 1 day, Culture of Greece has been reasonably active, but it is still pretty skeletal). It is also pretty clear that, barring accidents, U.S. embargo against Cuba and Chinese art will be COTW in the next two weeks; there are only 11 other candidates right now, most of which have been listed for less than 3 weeks: this seems to be mainly due to nominations drying up, but if it carries on, the candidates should only be on the list for a few weeks before they are selected anyway. -- ALoan (Talk) 13:56, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

COTW process improvement project
There seems to be some level of interest in improving the COOTW process. Maybe we need to tap into this by creating a Wikipedia talk:Collaboration of the week/Brainstorming improvements page for people to dump their suggestions on and then run those suggestions through a selection and verification process (not simple voting!) to try to come up with an improvement plan. What does everyone think? Filiocht 16:05, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)

Updates
Comments welcome on any of the above. -- ALoan (Talk) 23:03, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * I've streamlined the instructions, removing the 1-paragraph sections and replacing with a bulleted list.
 * I've also taken out the n votes per week comments, since the last nominations from before 1 September 2004 have been pruned or selected.
 * The page is down to 15 nominations, soon to be 12 when three get removed shortly. I think this reflects the accelerated pruning threshold, and loss of interest as it takes so long for an article to be selected at the moment: there is some feedback here and I hope this will get better - U.S. embargo against Cuba has been there for ages, but the others are only 4-5 weeks old.
 * I've wikilinked nomination and pruning dates: the new year will soon be upon us (the pruning date for Chinese art is already mid-December).
 * Good job. I support. [[User:Neutrality|Neutrality (hopefully!)]] 14:34, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)
 * I think that this page, and the concept behind it, are losing steam and dying. Soon, I'm afraid, the COTW will be no more. -Litefantastic 19:52, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * This voting concept is dreadfully poor. I'm not sure how to better improve it, but it is really hard to keep enthusiastic about the process when things languish for ages. But part of that is the fact that they are a collaboration for an entire week, which is quite a long time to work on one article, especially if one does not have anything to add to it. All it takes is one topic you know nothing about to get off track (there is only so much proof-reading that anybody wants to do!). If the collaborations lasted only two days, say, I think you would get about as much benefit out of it and keep people involved for a greater amount of time (perhaps more important than getting the articles to featured status: if we can turn substubs and stubs into at least somewhat respectable articles, if not the best examples of the community, I think we would be doing a great service, and could possibly move quite a lot of things off of cleanup). Well, it's an idea. --Fastfission 04:03, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

IIRC, the German, Japanese and Dutch Wikipedias have something similar to our CotW, but they focus on a subject with multiple articles instead of one article. That might be a good idea. The main benefit with it, I think, is that it allows for more flexibility in those who want to improve an article, and would be much more involved to nominate; this would thusly encourage people to improve the subject of the week and spend less time coming up with new articles for others to write about. For example, I write mostly about music, which intersects with articles on dance. I have come to the conclusion that Wikipedia's dance coverage is atrocious -- what information exists is hard to find and difficult to understand. However, there are no articles which are very suitable CotWs (except maybe choreography... maybe). Nevertheless, dance and various related articles could be much improved, and there are copious Internet resources to help, thus making it a good collaboration. I'm envisioning a nomination looking something like the below. (if anyone can fill in the details on what de, nl and ja do, please do so, as it could be helpful for us) Also, if we are talking about ways to improve Wikipedian collaboration, see the Featured Albums Project and WikiProject:World music's Phase 2 goals for some other collaboration systems I've come up with. Tuf-Kat 04:25, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)
 * Looks great. For example, the current "Culture of Greece" collaboration would include all the subarticles of the main theme, and many more could participate (for example myself; it's not very easy to summarize entire Greek culture, but researching the details would be easy). Support. --Farside 07:23, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I support shorter wait times and weeklong collaborations (I think that much time is needed to accomplish much, and allow everyone interested to help).
 * I disagree with CotWs on a collection of articles. CotW may be imperfect, but one advantage is the focus. Maurreen 01:24, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Dance

 * Not bad - Make featured: dance, modern dance, breakdancing, ballroom dance
 * Bad - Expand, organize and improve: waltz, tango, choreography, ballet, history of dance, tap dance, postmodern dance, heavy metal dance, dance notation, square dance, circle dance, erotic dance, samba, mosh, Mashed Potato, lambada, fandango, mazurka
 * Doesn't exist - Write: ritual dance, Electric Slide, Mexican Hat Dance, dance of Russia, dance of France, dance of China, polka and flamenco (articles exist but focus on music, either make a new section or disambiguated article)
 * Organizational list - Add captions and improve coverage: List of dance style categories, List of novelty/fad dances, List of folk dances sorted by origin
 * Other tasks: interlinking is terribly inconsistent and there are confusing overlaps on general topics (e.g. kinds of dances organized by purpose, performer and/or style); very confusing relationships between Latin dances (e.g. bolero, lambada, rumba, contradanse, contradance and contradanza (and country dance, or maybe just English country dance), conga, danzon and habanera, not to mention the dozens of Latin dance fads); aside from a brief mention or two, there is little explanation of connections between martial arts and dance

Links

 * Dance basic topics
 * great resource on dozens of modern and historical dances
 * article on ballet history
 * European social dances

Opinion

 * Support because I like to dance - User1
 * Support because I like words that begin with "d" - User2
 * Oppose as an act of protest - User3
 * Oppose because I enjoy being contrary - User4

Archiving of votes and comments
Are previous votes archived somewhere after deletion from the main article page (e.g., like now, after U.S. embargo against Cuba won the race)? Mikkalai 20:51, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * No: for some reason lost in the mists of time, the records of unsuccessful votes are archived in /Removed but no details of successful votes are kept in /History other than the number of votes and days on the list. Feel free to go back and extract the voting records and comments into, say, /History/Votes ;) -- ALoan (Talk) 12:25, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Tagging voter pages
If anyone wants to help me, I am starting at the top of this list and adding to eac user's talk page. If you start at the bottom, we should meet in the middle. Thanks. -- ALoan (Talk) 12:43, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Breadth and quality
I've had limited contributions to CotW, for various reasons. But I'm considering an additional form of CotW. If you&#8217;re interested, please see Breadth and quality. Maurreen 02:34, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Indian reservation vote reversal
Indian reservation's 35th vote has been retracted hours after the nominee's deadline to reach 35 votes. Should the nomination be deemed to have failed immediately or should it be given an extension (of say 24 hours) to meet the 35 vote threshold given that people who might have voted for the article might have thought it unnecessary since it seemed to be safe? What is the policy regarding vote retractions (2 have occured in this case)? Particularly what is the policy for vote retractions that would retroactively disqualify a candidate?AndyL 15:48, 30 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * I believe articles have previously been given the boot under similar circumstances. Specifically I remember Atilla the Hun being quickly removed after enough votes were withdrawn. - SimonP 17:45, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)
 * Yes - delete it. -- ALoan (Talk) 19:13, 30 Nov 2004 (UTC)
 * I just want to state that I think it's a real shame this listing was deleted. It clearly had a great deal of support, and I think would have been a very successful COTW. I think sticking so dogmatically to the rules may have been a waste in this case. For the record, when it was first nominated, it looked like this--I'm sure the growth has been a direct result of it's nomination here. Are we really punishing people for getting a head start on improving COTW nominees? jengod 19:55, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)
 * Not at all - if an article improves while it is a candidate, all well and good, but unless we prohibit people from withdrawing their votes, it wouldn't be fair to give it special treatment.


 * Actually, thinking about it further, if the vote was withdrawn after the thresold passed, shouldn't we have left it on the list until the next threshold?


 * Anyway, I think the article is looking quite reasonable now (although obviously more could be said), but there are plenty more fish in the sea. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:06, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

New template
I'm not sure I like the new Template:FAPath - the top of the page is really cluttered now, what with the WP:COTW shortcut, Template:CurrentCOTW and Template:COTWs. Comments? -- ALoan (Talk) 11:06, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
 * It's horrible, and not altogether accurate. How many FACs come from COTW? How many COTWs become FAs? It seems like most 'creative criticism comes when an article hits FAC, in reality. Filiocht 13:51, Dec 2, 2004 (UTC)
 * Sorry. I could get rid of it if you like. I thought it would be helpful. -Litefantastic 14:15, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Science COTW

 * I hate to hawk my own product here (especially since last time it was that lavender-colored template you all hate so much) but would you be willing to help out on the science COTW? I think there's endless possibility here (but then, I always say stuff like that) and all it needs is a kickstart. -Litefantastic 03:36, 4 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Informing voters of new winner
Is there an easy way of posting messages on the talk pages of all those who voted for African art that the article has won election as COTW? (ie a way to post a message on multiple talk pages simultaneously)? Posting the same message on 25 odd talk pages is somewhat tedious. AndyL 18:36, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Sectstub and Sect-stub
To anyone who is using either of these templates. Please be advised,   != (does not equal)   . Please remember to include the section number when using  . -- AllyUnion (talk) 13:09, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Pruning
The concept of pruning is fine, but there is no date on the articles up for CTOW, so how do we know when to prune? - Amgine 22:47, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Christmas
With the Christmas holidays should we delay the next COTW selection by a week until Jan 2, 2005 (and give all current nominees a one week grace period?)? I don't think a COTW for December 26 - January 2 will get very much work done on it. AndyL 17:24, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Removing a template
I don't want to be too bold on this, so I'll ask for input. Does anyone else think that maybe we should get rid of at least one template? Multiple templates + my monitor resolution = squeezed text and one headache trying to read some things. But then again, others may like the templates. So what do you think? -- The KoG | Talk 14:03, Dec 22, 2004 (UTC)


 * Which one? -- ALoan (Talk) 15:40, 22 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Well, the consensus above seems to be that the FAPath one was unnecessary, and one user referred to it as "horrible". So that one, I guess. -- The KoG | Talk 17:02, Dec 22, 2004 (UTC)

OK, I moved the FAPath template farther down the page, which should satisfy both my screwed up text and those who want to keep the template. -- The KoG | Talk 20:40, Dec 29, 2004 (UTC)