Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rugby league/Article improvement drive

You have probably been directed here because I've sent you this or a similar message: Hey I've noticed you're a regular on rugby league articles, particulary NRL ones. I need your advice on something I'm thinking of starting up on the project. Many WikiProjects have Article Improvement Drives which have different levels of success. I'm thinking of starting one up for this one too, but instead of voting on an article I would rather strive to improve one NRL club every fortnight and bring it up very close to featured status. Now it seems as though there'd be a lot of work involved, but there are also a lot of club fans out there who'd probably be willing to participate. Basically there are 30 weeks in the NRL season and there are 15 club pages that are not yet featured. I propose that we all have a schedule to work on one new article every second round, in alphabetical order. By the end of the season hopefully we will have 15 near-complete, if not complete articles. My only concern at this stage is the dedication of editors to help out other team pages that they are not interested in. Basically in order to get the support of editors like these, we need a few leaders in the project. If you are willing to dedicate a bit of your time every week into this and if you have any further suggestions, could you let me know at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rugby league/Article improvement drive? Thanks, --mdmanser 05:53, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I've sent the message to about a eighteen members of WPRL who I can see are or have been major editors on NRL club pages. The more regualar editors we get on this project the better. We're also going to need the help of many other non-regular Wikipedia editors such as those found on fan forums on the internet, to add information on their corresponding club pages to help in the process.

If you are interested in joing the project just add your name to the list so we can co-ordinate the effort amongst active contributors.
 * 1) mdmanser (Sydney Roosters)
 * 2) Gonzerelli (St. George Illawarra Dragons)
 * 3) Sticks66
 * 4) Cas Liber 03:20, 21 February 2007 (UTC) (Doggies)
 * 5) CumberlandsAshes81 04:18, 21 February 2007 (UTC) (Parramatta)
 * 6) GizzaChat  &#169; Involvement will be limited (Panthers/Titans?)
 * 7) User:JRA_WestyQld2 (North Queensland Cowboys)
 * 8) Tiburon (Bradford Bulls/Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks)
 * 9) Crico (Chooks)
 * 10) bradgraham (Canterbury Bulldogs)
 * 11) fiery-bond (Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles)
 * 12) Londo06 (St Helens / Souths)
 * 13) Alexsanderson83 (Harlequins RL / Brisbane Broncos)
 * 14) SpecialWindler 21:25, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
 * 15) fishes dish (Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks)

Aim

 * Aim to bring one National Rugby League club page up to featured article status every two weeks.
 * Each article's structure should be based on the structure of Sydney Roosters.
 * Articles should be heavily referenced (this is essential even though it is possibly the most annoying task of them all).


 * To make National Rugby League clubs a featured topic by the end of the season in time for the centenary of rugby league in Australia.

Structure

 * Structure of the project - up for discussion.
 * Perhaps if each club's fan forums are notified of this effort then those fans could lead to the building of the article for the first of the two weeks.
 * Articles could then be wikified and copyedited in the second week, along with references by non-fans associated with this project.


 * The project is big and will take a lot of time and effort, but if achieved it could stand out as one of the biggest accomplishments on Wikipedia ever. Keep in mind this is more than an "improvement drive". Optimistically it is a featured article drive, which requires articles to be of the highest quality. Please post further comments or suggestions and notify other users if you think it would be beneficial. --mdmanser 06:13, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Discuss
Already onto the Rabbitohs. But what are we going to do about the Famous Supporters section of the club articles. Roosters FA doesn't have one. I know it's of some interest given these people are partly responsible for Souths still being around, but another view says "So what?". Giorgio Armani a Rabbitohs fan ! gimme a break Sticks66 13:08, 21 February 2007 (UTC)


 * DaGizza suggested we remove the famous fans sections altogether (which I agree), and I agree with your comments on my talk page about removing ownership and privatisation as it currently exists. See Arsenal FC page though - I based the Sydney Roosters structure on it except I didn't do an ownership section on it. Perhaps one on South Sydney's page might be more acceptable? --mdmanser 14:16, 21 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Should we aim to officially start the project now or at the start of the NRL season? I don't really mind doing work on a couple of the articles already but perhaps we should wait a little while before officially selecting the second article to do after the Rabbitohs. Some of the basic project tasks we could do beforehand include putting full 2007 squads up on each page using the squad template (once team pages are uploaded onto the NRL website) and putting up records and honours section (the stat lovers including me could rip into that). --mdmanser 14:36, 21 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Oh dear @ the thought of relying on NRL.com to be updated!!! Anyway...
 * While there truly are a number of famous fans (such as the fact that our Prime Minister is widely known for his support of the Dragons), others can be a little more ambiguous... I would suggest it be removed as a "section", however very notable ones (eg. for Dragons - John Howard & Morris Iemma) could be noted in passing.
 * One of the reasons removing this would be ideal is because it encourages lists to be made. Lists are bad! Text blocks are good!
 * As for when to start... Nothing stopping us doing some preliminary work done now... On a general basis, like we are now, discussing the types of things we may or may not do with pages. I would suggest that mdmanser make up a "schedule" for the remaining 15 clubs, in order of how badly they need an overhaul! I would suggest we spend one week on each, and then re-assess and give each page a second week's work.
 * Just my thoughts :)
 * Gonzerelli 00:05, 22 February 2007 (UTC)


 * (PS. There are only 29 weeks in this season... But we'll work around that :) ) Gonzerelli 00:08, 22 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree about starting with the Honours and records sections for each club - which need to be standardised. Also, Most clubs have already announced their official 2007 contracted players list.
 * In relation to the Famous Fans sections - they are generally unverifiable, or at most based on pretty scant evidence and don't really contribute terribly much to the understanding of a first-time reader. The only reason they should be in an article is where those celebrities have involved themselves in the running of a club or have been ambassadors for the club. For example, a lot of UK football(soccer) clubs quite legitimately list famous fans because the famous fans themselves often involve themselves in the running of the club (board membership, ownership, etc.) This is true in Souths' case so I think the list should probably be retained and include those fans who have involved themselves in the politics of the club. This wouldn't be true for, say, Parramatta where Hollywood actor Simon Baker may be a fan but has no involvement with the club. CumberlandsAshes81 02:27, 22 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Yeah I could give it a go.. I used to be a lot more active on Wikipedia but meh. --JRA WestyQld2 11:08, 22 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Wow someone should have organised something similar to this a long time ago; glad someone has finally had the initiative and done so :). I agree with the Famous fans sections they should be removed, the number of times I have had to delete people who randomly decide to add themselves has become a bit annoying. Also I hope that this drive begins with some standardised format/template for all of the rugby league clubs, it looks a bit stupid having all of our teams pages so diff. especially in comparison to some of the other sports such as the NFL with it's team pages all alike. It might also be an idea for someone to come up with/team of people to agree to a standard player profile template as at the moment several exist. Glad something like this is happening Tiburon 09:00, 23 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree with the general comments made above about the famous fans sections. The only famous fans that stay should be so notable that they have influenced the club (Best example is Russell Crowe with the Rabbits). Otherwise, they have no real value. GizzaChat  &#169; 04:45, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

For what its worth, http://web.archive.org/collections/web.html might be a good site for referencing old information. Type in the web address (eg www.broncos.com.au) and it comes up with archived pages, which is where I got the Super League Broncos logo from, which is now on the Broncos pageSteeden 06:12, 26 February 2007 (UTC).

Project Timetable
I think in order to assess the effectiveness of such a collaboration (to get articles to a genuinely featured status), we should work on the three most comprehensive articles first, before deciding the time frame to then do other articles. If we are able to finish three articles within six weeks and get mostly positive comments on "Featured Article Candidates" then we shall continue the 2-week format. For instance, After that we'll decide which articles are then easiest to update, and how long we shall spend on each. Already a number of editors are working on South Sydney Rabbitohs, and I believe that it could get to a stage very soon where we won't even need to wait until the first two rounds to update it at all. Positive signs already. What does everybody else think of the current setup with timetabling? mdmanser 11:28, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Rounds 1-2: South Sydney Rabbitohs
 * Rounds 3-4: Canterbury Bulldogs
 * Rounds 5-6: Parramatta Eels

Week 1-2: South Sydney Rabbitohs
Well it's the start of the week of the first round, so I guess this project is now open and working officially. The first page to be worked on is South Sydney Rabbitohs. Some things to be done: Once all of this is done it might be worth getting it copyedited properly by an outside editor and then assessing the quality of the rest of the article before taking the next step (further editing or straight to FAC). Good luck everyone, and hopefully we'll get quite a few featured articles at the end of the year. Cheers, --mdmanser 07:04, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Tidy up lead.
 * Rewrite/fix up "crest" section.
 * Expand "supporters" and remove the majority of famous fans from list - I suggest we also add a paragraph of the rallies held in 2000 and 2001. Anyone who has a better memory than me might want to get working on that.
 * Consolidate "records" section. At the moment the information is all there, but it just needs to be formatted into a more paragraphed and stylised way.
 * Use the cite template for all footnotes. That will prevent formatting problems.


 * Thanks for getting this going, Mdmanser - hopefully we can achieve some great results! Some comments:


 * It's interesting to note that the Records section in the Sydney Roosters article appears to be more or less formatted the same as Souths. Perhaps a table for this information?  I think that would be a superior way of presenting the information - or following the style for 'Club Honours'.
 * The 'famous fans' section is pretty well culled now - I would probably argue that Ricky Ponting and Shane Warne aren't supporters but the ones that would have raised eyebrows have long gone. CumberlandsAshes81 03:25, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Week 3-4: Parramatta Eels
The Rabbitohs drive is still a bit short of the mark but would only take a few hours work from one motivated person to finish it off.

The Parramatta Eels article was very well established already, and it didn't take a lot of work for me to rearrange things and trim things down. What's needed now is a statistics/records section and possibly a supporters section. But most of all, references are the big key to making this article a success. If we can get 30 we're doing very well. Anything close to 50 would be outstanding. What's there now is looking pretty good, and just a few changes are needed to fix some grammar and formatting off completely. Cheers. --mdmanser 15:01, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

South Sydney Rabbitohs nominated as FA candidate
All, the article on South Sydney Rabbitohs has now been nominated as a Featured Article candidate. Sattlersjaw 00:24, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
 * How do we drive this forward to consensus? There are two objecting comments with both objections having been solved, but no recognition (yet) from those opposing that the problems have been solved. Are these two users required to come back and state whether their objections have been successfully resolved and change their opposition to support?  For an article of this quality it's a bit frustrating that the only comments have been fair-use nitpicking without any recognition that the article qualifies on other grounds. CumberlandsAshes81 02:22, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I've never quite understood some of the FA reviewers who spend 3 sentences describing a small punctuation or grammar mistake, and even offer suggestions on how to fix it. They themselves would find it much easier to just edit the article (which would take 15 seconds). As for the users you describe above - leave a message on their talk page. Almost always they come back and amend their decision once you notify them. --mdmanser 07:28, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

What an utter joke of a process. The article is given barely a week to be reviewed before being rejected? There are articles on the list that have been under consideration for more than a month. Everything that was identified as being an impediment to achieving FA status was totally objective and has now either been fixed or was in the process of being fixed. I can't help but feel that the nomination was hardly given a 'fair go'. CumberlandsAshes81 07:10, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Article
hey guys, I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this - feel free to shift it if needbe. I just wanted to draw your attentions to this.  L.J.Skinner wot 15:17, 1 August 2008 (UTC)