Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2010-05-31/Features and admins

Approved this week

By seresin, 31 May 2010
Please see the talk page of this article for a letter from your editor.

Administrators

One editor was granted admin status via the Requests for Adminship process this week:

.

Bots

Six new bot tasks were approved this week, leaving 20 open applications.

• DASHBot (task 12) Solve redirects on templates that use navbox
• Signpost Book Bot (task) Takes Wikipedia Signpost articles and puts them into book form
• AnomieBOT II (task) Create daily subpages of Template:TFA title
• SporkBot (task) Orphan/substitute templates listed at WP:TFD/H
• TedderBot (task 5) automagically remove {{current}} template (and others, currently {{current related}}) from stale pages
• SmackBot (task XXIX) Clean up specific section headers, expand month abbreviations, various minor fixes common to pages in Category:Wikipedia articles incorporating text from the Air Force Historical Research Agency

Featured pages

Ten articles were promoted to featured status this week: Action of 1 August 1801 (nom), Cyclone Gonu (nom), Brill railway station (nom), HMAS Australia (1911) (nom), Lycoperdon echinatum (nom), Parthian Empire (nom), Henrik Sedin (nom), Banksia menziesii (nom), Keith Miller with the Australian cricket team in England in 1948 (nom) and Lemurs of Madagascar (book) (nom).

Four lists were promoted to featured status this week: List of numbered roads in Kawartha Lakes (nom), List of protected areas of Svalbard (nom), Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance (nom) and Spice Girls discography (nom).

No topics were promoted to featured status this week.

No portals were promoted to featured status this week.

The following featured articles were displayed on the Main Page as Today's featured article this week: Victoria Cross, John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, Jupiter Trojans, Iravan, Jesus College Boat Club, Tōru Takemitsu and Bronwyn Bancroft.

Former featured pages

Two articles were delisted this week: Delhi (nom) and Aleksandr Vasilevsky (nom).

No lists were delisted this week.

No topics were delisted this week.

No portals were delisted this week.

Featured media

The following featured pictures were displayed on the Main Page as picture of the day this week: Hakea laurina; Spotted Dove; Cornelius Vanderbilt; Tachysphex sp.; Albino American Alligator; Polyporus squamosus and Act III, Scene 6, from Le Cid.

No featured sounds were promoted this week.

One featured picture was demoted this week: Takakkaw Falls (nom).

Ten pictures were promoted to featured status this week.

• 
  Chicago skyline at sunrise
• 
  Chicago 'L' tracks in the Chicago Loop at the Adams/Wabash station at night
• 
  Inachis io
• 
  1937 anti-Bolshevik Nazi propaganda poster
• 
  Pachygrapsus marmoratus
• 
  Period sketch of an encampment on the California Trail
• 
  Tasmanian Pademelon

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In this issue

31 May 2010

Photography

News and notes

WikiProject report

Features and admins

Arbitration report

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Discuss this story

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Letter from your editor

The format and content of this page has remained largely unchanged since I took on writing it regularly sometime in late 2008. I think it might a time for some changes. To that end, I would like to know what you, the readers, think would be good changes for the regular Features and Admins page. Is there something you would expect to find here that you don't? Or do you wish something were written a different way, or with more detail? Or something else entirely, be it the design, presentation or content. Please feel free to make any suggestion you have, however small or large. You may leave comments here, at the Signpost talk page, or at my talk page; I will have all pages watchlisted. I am eager to make this page as useful as I can, and so I look forward to hearing suggestions and ideas from you. Thanks. ÷seresin 19:42, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, a short summary of each RfA would be cool. "Most supports didn't see a reason not to promote, but several objects felt the editor was too young" or something. It might be cool to know who the noms were for the FAs and other FXs. Just thinking out loud. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:37, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

I think this is uncalled for. You've just failed an RfA and then the reasons are trumpeted here very publicly? It's different for a demoted article, though—not so much at stake personally. Tony (talk) 12:10, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

A different suggestion: a cumulative (year-to-date) summary for RfAs (even better, a comparison to last year), so, for example:

One editor, FoobarIII, was granted admin status; there were also two candidacies closed as unsuccessful. The year-to-date totals are 22 new admins and 47 unsuccessful candidacies, compared to 26 and 44 at this time last year.

-- John Broughton (♫♫) 18:17, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

You could have less focus on what pictures (or articles) have just appeared on the main page - that information is highly visible, has already just been promoted, and is easy to find for those interested.

You could mention Good Articles that have just been listed. This information is less easy to find, is useful to have a record of, is motivational for those involved, and serves as an incentive for people to check to see if the listing was appropriate. Good Articles are not promoted anywhere on Wikipedia - they are quiet listings, so a little bit of light to show up poor listings or to encourage those involved in appropriate listings would be worthwhile. SilkTork *^YES! 22:37, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

• I think it's wonderful the way it is, and I read it every week. You don't need to change a thing. -- œ^™ 08:52, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
  • Well I wasn't going to say any more, but such flowery, blanket praise makes me wonder whether OE has thought about how it might be improved. Please compare with this version, which improves the layout, the use of visual resources, provides in a few places information that might be just a little interesting to readers, and avoids the repetitious "this week", which appears umpteen times. I find it odd to see the word "wonderful" appended to a page that so patently needs improvement, and that has retained the same basic formula for years, as the author points out. The author clearly has doubts about it herself, or wouldn't have asked for comments. Tony (talk) 15:37, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
    • I hope I didn't come across as negative towards the other commenters. I'm not trying to put down anyone elses suggestions for improvement.. of course I'd be happy with any changes that would make Signpost better, a net positive is just that, a plus. I just happen to disagree that this page needs any 'fixing' at all. Personally I think improvements CAN be made, but that it doesn't necessarily NEED any. I guess I tend to hold the conservative views of "Change = Bad", "If it ain't broke don't fix it", "Don't mess with a winning formula", etc. etc. As for my flowery wonderful comment, I'm actually glad I used that particular word (hey I could've said it was 'fabulous' instead ;P). It was intended to be encouraging, a little morale boost maybe. Because if the author is starting to have doubts then I hope I raised his spirits a little and reassured him that he's doing a fine.. no... wonderful job ;) Especially since he's been doing this regularly since late 2008, I'm just grateful that we have someone willing to make such an effort, and that's why I couldn't presume to think I could do any better. However since the author has requested suggestions, I'm definitely not opposed to anyone's changes if the author really feels that it's necessary. -- œ^™ 19:12, 5 June 2010 (UTC)
      • This is just a formula for freezing the whole of WP the way it was in 2003. Your extreme resistance to change ("Change = Bad") would mean we wouldn't even have the Internet—and would still make phone calls through a manual exchange. "I'm just grateful that we have someone willing to make such an effort, and that's why I couldn't presume to think I could do any better." I'm grateful, too, but it doesn't mean the product can't be vastly improved. I don't see this in personal terms, whereas you appear to. If you're going to be destructive of ideas for improvement, it would be better if you kept out of the discussion. What is thoroughly galling is the self-congratulation and complacence inherent in your attitude. What, exactly, don't you think is an improvement in the other version? The bottom line you seem to be unaware of is that many people find The Singpost boring, and don't read it. Don't you care about that? Tony (talk) 03:42, 6 June 2010 (UTC)
        • Oh no, seems I'm misunderstood again. I am definitely NOT trying to be destructive of ideas for improvement, I thought I made that clear already. I'm GLAD if (key word if) it can be improved and don't have any opinion at all about your 'other version'. I am of the opinion that this page (not the entire signpost) is fine the way it is and I have a right to that opinion and am perfectly in my rights to state it in this discussion. Don't be so concerned with me thinking things should stay the same, just go ahead and discuss your improvements, I'm not opposed to them and am not trying to sway others from making improvements. mmkay? -- œ^™ 06:04, 6 June 2010 (UTC)
• It would be more constructive to comment on the actual changes proposed in the other version. They are listed above, adjacent to the link. Tony (talk) 06:36, 6 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure this idea is very relevant to this particular segment of the Signpost, but I would personally like to see a summary of the past week's internal events, discussions, and happenings. Juliancolton (talk) 01:55, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Ten promoted pictures?

Only seven are displayed. Is this correct? —  Tivedshambo  (t/c) 21:56, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

Yeeeees, well I fixed it when I put a huge amount of work into improving the page last night, but I don't see it. Tony (talk) 02:12, 2 June 2010 (UTC)

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