Wikipedia talk:WikiProject United States

 

See also: Discusión del Wikiproyecto Estados Unidos (Español)

Greetings from GLAM-Wiki US

Invitation to join GLAM-Wiki US

Hello! This WikiProject aligns closely with the work of the GLAM-Wiki initiative (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums), a global community of volunteers who assist cultural institutions with sharing resources with Wikimedia. GLAM-Wiki US is a new community initiative focused on organizing cultural collaborations within the United States. GLAM organizations are diverse and span numerous topics, from libraries and art museums to science centers and historic sites. We currently have a backlog of interested institutions- and we need your help! Are you interested in helping with current or future GLAM projects? Join→ Online Volunteers We hope you'll join the growing GLAM-Wiki community in the US. Thank you! -Lori Phillips (Talk), US Cultural Partnerships Coordinator For more information visit→ The GLAM:US portal or GLAM-Wiki on Outreach

Update on project wide article assessments

We are doing great so far on the assessments for the project. Not only have we dropped from 28, 647 articles needing assessment to below 16, 700 (representing about 42% complete, we also dropped from 73, 309 articles lacking importance to below 36, 000 (representing 50.9% complete). At the same time we added about 27, 000 pieces of content and several projects so great job for those that are working on this.

Many of you are focusing on specific projects so this progress bar chart will not truly reflect your efforts but the chart below does give an idea where the project as a whole stands.

Again great job. Kumioko (talk) 18:24, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

What is going on here?

What's this business of WikiProject United States taking over all the state wikiprojects? This is inane. I've been actively working under the auspices of the WikiProject Rhode Island, and then it gets sucked up into some big meaningless conglomerate. This is a corporate takeover. Come on folks, what's next? WikiPrjoect Wikipedia? Wikiproject World? I would like to be working within a wikiproject that is limited in scope and meaningful. Please return Rhode Island to its own wikiproject!Sarnold17 (talk) 09:26, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry your upset. WikiProject Rhode Island is still its own project the only thing that changed was that it shares the same banner with all its functionality, some of the project pages where standardized to make them easier to update and a couple of bots where setup to automate a couple tasks. There is no requirement for you to do anything outside WikiProject Rhode Island and in fact each of the state project still need help and support including Rhode Island. Also see the discussion on the WikiProject Rhode Island talk page. Agathoclea is exactly right in their comments as well. We didn't do anything without discussion. I started a discussion on the project page and left it for 18 days before taking action, that was back in September 2011 and here it is July 2012. That to me is a pretty good indication that the project could use a little help which is what we are trying to do. Not a hostile takeover. I hope this helps explain things a little. I really hope you continue to participate in the Rhode Island project, the project needs editors and so do the articles it supports. Kumioko (talk) 11:12, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

I would contend it's been far more helpful to have the full resources of the US wikiproject at your disposal. Many of the state wikiprojects have only a few active editors by themselves. —Ed!^(talk) 13:45, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your speedy response. I now see two issues. The first is not that RI falls under the United States project; the issue is that the identification of the article with Rhode Island gets lost on the talk page with this big banner with an American flag. The identification of the article with Rhode Island is reduced to a single line with a couple of symbols. The banner totally misplaces the emphasis of what the article is about. Who cares that the article is about the United States? That probably applies to a majority of articles on English wikipedia. The emphasis should be placed on the individual states. Yes, the big issue is the banner. And not only is the emphasis mis-directed, but so is the importance scale. I might have a subject who was in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, and the importance may have been mid, high, and top in each one respectively. However, on the scale of the United States, the subject would have a low importance, because someone in Wagon Tracks, Montana may have never heard of the subject. So now, what do we put for the rating? The second issue is that the use of state banners is not consistent. Yesterday I was trying to incorporate a banner for a subject that was in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New York. Under the United States banner I added the RI and MA codes, but it didn't work for NY. I, of course, discovered that New York has kept its original state banner (hooray for New York!), and that a state code did not work under the United States banner. Also, I did not just recently discover this issue; I became unhappy about it several months ago when I began seeing the old banners replaced by the new. I didn't pay a lot of attention to it because I was much more interested in creating content; however I was annoyed by what I saw. I only visit the Rhode Island project page occasionally, because, as you noted, there's not much going on there, and I think I'm the only one that has made any changes to it in the past two years. However, on a fluke, I visited the project's talk page for the first time, yesterday, and noticed that another editor voiced a concern about this issue several months ago. That's all I needed to go public with my dissatisfaction. So, in recap, I find that the WikiProject United States banner is inappropriate due to a mis-placed emphasis, and I find its importance rating scale (already an ambiguous issue) to be unclear and mis-directed; and that the use of state codes is not consistent. Thanks for listening.Sarnold17 (talk) 14:02, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

I understand the concern, but please keep in mind this is a global encyclopedia. It does not, and should not, show preference to the United States, or organize itself in any way as though the US is the primary audience. The crux of notability is focused on the global importance -- for everything. If an article is notable only in one state and unheard of elsewhere, we should be questioning if it is notable enough to be on Wikipedia. —Ed!^(talk) 14:19, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, wikipedia is global, but I'm not going to back down from my position. I would be equally as dismayed if WikiProject Linicolnshire got sucked up into WikiProject United Kingdom. If I'm going to read an article about England, I'd like to know where in England the emphasis lies. If I'm going to write an article that is of concern to a specific shire in England, then I want that reflected on the talk page, not WikiProject United Kingdom.Sarnold17 (talk) 14:28, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Since you raised several points I am going to respond to each separately as bulleted below. Please let me know if I missed any:

1. Use of the WPUS Project banner - I understand that by using the banner the Rhode Island project doesn't have a big bold banner itself however I also don't think that its hidden either. I have tried to make the supported projects display as boldly and evenly as I can. I have tried several things to make the supported projets more prominantly unfortunately I am also bound by the technical limitations of the banner.
2. Not all state projects are supported - Your also correct in that not all US related projects are supported by WPUS. Currently there are 93 supported projects which can be seen if you look at the project page for WikiProject United States. You'll see the list of supported projects, which is currently only about half the states.
3. Differing importance - The WikiProject United States supports multi importance for articles. This means that an article can have a different importance rating for United States and for each supported project. So it could be Low for US, Top for Montana, High for American Old West, etc.
4. Only occassional visits to the Project page - The problem here is that no one seemed to update or respond to comments on the project. Its great that editors like yourself are editing the articles and they are frankly more important than the prjoect, however if the project isn't updated then it isn't good either.

As with Ed I think that the Rhode Island project and its articles gains more from the WPUS support than it lost in its banner but I hope this helps to explain things a little.Kumioko (talk) 14:37, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Re traffic statistics on project pages - a sobering reality Not just US states, but any project page..69.237.146.24 (talk) 14:51, 16 July 2012 (UTC)

Some projects are rather active (ie. WP:MILHIST), but most aren't that active. The question is how large a net to throw in consolidation, and how big is too big for a regular wikiproject which instead should be a coordination wikiproject. Per discussions at WP:CANADA and WP:COUNCIL, all the states can be signed on to WP:USA banner regardless of the feelings of the projects being signed on, as long as you don't redirect their own banner to the WP:USA banner. Though if you track what happened at WP:CANADA, they tend to delete banners of projects they "sign on" to their mass banner, and that ends up with bad feelings from the other projects for denigrating their topics (especially by removing banners from their top importance articles) And projects that got their banners replaced end up having lower activity, so killing those projects off, effectively. So... if a project is signed onto WPUSA's banner, should there be an active drive to replace that projects banner with the mass WPUSA banner? If there is, it could end up by killing the smaller project, since their information would disappear with you use bannershell, and their importances disappear if you don't expand everything.

However, if you look at WP:MILHIST, the merging of projects, and their talk pages, that increased activity, and the number of watchers and editors available to improve and fix the articles. So, the converse was true, since each project was focused in too small an area to maintain an active userbase, but many of the users of the main project shared interests, and would help out when issues came out.

Personally, I think that top and high importance articles should use a separate banner, to make it clear who actually cares about the topic. -- 76.65.131.160 (talk) 04:45, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I think this is my biggest concern about losing the individual state tags; when you have a subject that is truly and legitimately of high or top importance to a project, that fact gets totally lost in the enormity of an entity as big as the United States. Thanks for adding your $.02.Sarnold17 (talk) 13:19, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

I can see that WPUS is actually working, because I've seen tags appearing in a lot of the content that I've created, but have avoided updating the talk page. This has prompted me to go back and clean house, and as of yesterday I have redone all of the tags in every article that I've created, and many others in which I have an interest. So, hooray for WPUS. However, the issue remains that the emphasis of the article is lost with the WPUS tag. The solution: redesign the WPUS tag. Put the WPUS business in fine print at the top of the tag, and then allow each state to have its bold and shiny symbols, ratings AND IMPORTANCE, so that it STANDS OUT as it did with individual state tags. After all, if you want to know what an article is about, you go to the talk page and look at the tags. That's the way it was pre-September 2011. Since then, when you go to the talk page you see WikiProject United States loudly proclaimed, and then somewhere in the substrata lies the IMPORTANT state info. As in my earlier comments: the emphasis needs to be reversed.Sarnold17 (talk) 13:41, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

First let me say thanks for the props. Disagreements aside its nice to know that people feel that things are working. If the importance is the main problem then its really a non issue. As I mentioned before the template allows for every project to have its own importance. Its right there in parenthesis right after the project name and Icon. I might be able to code something that emphasises them a little more but I'm not sure. The code for that template is ridiculously complex and its used by a lot of projects so even minor changes can have far reaching consequences. It really boils down to this, if the project(s) want to break away thats fine, however if there are no editors who are willing to maintain that project, monitor the talk page and take care of the Project tasks and articles then its counterproductive to be alone. The fact that it took 9 months for anyone to notice or comment that the project had been added to the supported projects list seems evidence enough to me that its not a problem. I would also note that it is quite a bit of work to convert a template into or out of the WPUS one so if Rhode Island or another project decides to leave it will take some time to craft some code and apply the change. Since Rhode Island has over 3300 articles currently with a lot more that could/should be tagged (I haven't finished running them yet till this discussion is over) it could be about 5500-6000 pieces of content total including images, categories, templates and the like. We would also need to redirect several bots and support pages to reflect the change. Its doable but a bit of effort. Kumioko (talk) 13:52, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

I don't mean for this to sound as harsh as it's probably going to, but I find this a curious statement: "After all, if you want to know what an article is about, you go to the talk page and look at the tags." With all due respect, if I want to know what the article is about, I read the lead. I rarely visit the talk page, and if I do, it's usually to see if an issue about the article content is being discussed, not to see what WikiProjects are interested in the article. The only exception is if I want to make sure it is tagged for WikiProject Kentucky, my WikiProject of choice. Besides all this, the individual WikiProjects still maintain their own project pages and categories that reflect an article's importance relative to that WikiProject, so I don't see how the present arrangement impedes their work on that front. The counter argument to making each state project's symbol (usually a flag) more visible is that the talk pages of articles that are supported by multiple states (and there are several such articles) get cluttered with lots and lots of flags. I personally don't see a problem with the present arrangement. Acdixon ^{(talk · contribs)} 14:39, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

I had to ask for help on this one but take a look at this.

I think adding the extra block of color is a little much but this will allow the supported projects importance to be much more prominant and visible compared to WikiProject United States. Let me know what you think. Kumioko (talk) 23:40, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

Thank you, Kumioko, for your efforts to bring some resolution to this. You have indicated that you don't care for the cosmetic change, and I suspect that a majority of those reading this would agree with you. I find it a step in the right direction, but also realize that it doesn't resolve one of the basic issues I had in the beginning, and that is that the United States is way too big a topic on which to assess things. When articles are assessed using such a broad brush, we then lessen the ability to differentiate between articles, and therefor lose some color, flavor and interest in the wikipedia experience. Certainly WPUS was created for a purpose, to bring multiple inactive projects under some form of active oversight. But why do we have to assess articles on such a massive scale? I remember the first time I noticed a WPUS banner on the talk page of one of my articles. I didn't know what happened. I went back and tried to re-create the old Rhode Island banner, but couldn't do it. Something was lost. Taken away was some little bit of identity that I had become accustomed to seeing in the articles of interest to me in my tiny little corner of the world.

I would have never brought up this entire mess had I not seen that one other editor voiced a concern some time ago. That editor has not chimed in on the current discussion of the issue, and I don't see any result to my venting that is going to produce the change in my mind's eye, or bring things back to the way they were. I don't think I have much support, and I sense that support for keeping the things the way they are now is fairly strong. For this reason, I would like to bow out of this discussion, with sincere apologies for becoming the fly in the ointment. I'd rather not see any changes made at all, because they will consume time and effort on someone's part, where the effort may be more fruitfully used elsewhere. I will get over my difficulties, and currently need to get back to more important endeavors. So thanks to all who chimed in, and particularly to you, Kumioko, for your sincere efforts at appeasement.Sarnold17 (talk) 12:27, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I just want you to know that I have no problem with you or that you brought up the issue. I understand your feelings and I appreciate your willingness to be flexible. I truly believe that the projects are stronger and more effective working as a group and as a whole than as individuals. Please let me know if you have any other ideas or concerns about the project or how it functions. Kumioko (talk) 13:30, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm coming to this really late, but are the importance ratings really needed? They're extremely subjective, and Milhist gets along just fine without them (possibly even better, with no importance-related disputes!). Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 03:11, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Demographic information

I'm not sure where to ask this, so I'll float it here and we'll see how it goes. On what seems like hundreds of thousands of articles on Wikipedia about United States local municipalities (cities, townships, counties), there are demographic blurbs. They were predominantly taken from the 2000 Census, and there is an incomplete effort to transition this to 2010 Census information. I am particularly interested in the median household/family income data. Where was this drawn from, and what's being done to update it for 2010? Is income even something that the Census measures, or is that handled separately by the American Community Survey? I think some effort at consistency here is worth thinking through. What source was used for the 2000 median income information? MrArticleOne (talk) 14:36, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I agree that this data was likely derived from the 2000 census and a lot needs to be updated with the new data. Additionally many of the URL's have changes so the sources needs to be updated as well. It is a massive task and has come up before. I think that some can be updated with a bot but the last time it came up none of the bot operators were interested in doing it. I also seem to remember some folks feeling like using the census data directly constituted original research but there were a lot of us that didn't agree with that either. I don't remember what the last thoughts were. I'm not 100% sure what the source used was for the median income but it was probably the census. I would say if you find a source, like the new census I would go ahead and update it. I hope this helps and please let me know if you have any ideas of how to update even some of these. Kumioko (talk) 14:44, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Actually, I'm not sure that the Census collects median income information. Like I say, it may come from other sources. I was really trying to figure out what source was used in 2000. I'm not an expert on what information the Census collects. I haven't seen income information in the Census results I've nosed through, but that could just mean it hasn't been released yet, since the data comes out in waves. MrArticleOne (talk) 15:03, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I was working on Table of United States Micropolitan Statistical Areas, and I updated 48 manually, and have 528 to go. Yes, it's a massive task. Does anyone know of a way to transmit easily, the csv or xls tables from the Census Bureau into the tables in these respective table articles (on CSA, MSA, etc.)? Thanks, --Funandtrvl (talk) 15:49, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Do you have a link to one as an example? Kumioko (talk) 15:57, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, the new data is here for the micropolitan table -- csv or in xls. --Funandtrvl (talk) 16:09, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Do you want the whole table converted as is or do you need some changes to it. Converting it to a table should be pretty easy. The hardest part would be gettint the header columns right but all the main section would only take a couple minutes. Kumioko (talk) 16:55, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, the whole table would need to be converted. The only difference is that the list from the Census Bureau is alphabetical, and the table in the article is by ranking. It's a sortable table, so I don't know how you could make it by ranking, using the csv stuff. Let me know how you do it, is it a script?? --Funandtrvl (talk) 17:10, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

OK no problem. Its not so much a script as a process. I pull the table into excel. Concatenate the columns putting |- and | in place as necessary. Then I take that whole table into Word and replace the |- and | with themselves and a line break and then I build the column header manually. It sounds harder than it really is. Once you've done it once or twice it doesn't take long. Can you tell me hwo the columns matchup between the csv linked above and the articles table? I see on the CSV there are 2 different sets of date fields and don't know which to use. Kumioko (talk) 17:19, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

In the meantime, User:Buaidh has graciously updated the table for us, and I will check the other tables too. I'm wondering if you and he use the same way to convert the tables? So, the tables are taken care of, but the thousands of articles, as mentioned above, don't have the demographic updates yet, like # of households, age of residents, breakdown of races, etc. Any ideas on how to automate the process? And thanks so much for letting me know how to convert these tables, I never would have thought of it!! --Funandtrvl (talk) 18:55, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm sure there must be a way but I don't know exactly how it could be done. Its possible that if we submit a bot request someone will do it but I haven't had very good luck with that myself. I do agree it needs to be done though. Kumioko (talk) 19:01, 18 July 2012 (UTC)

The historic Daisy video

Should this be the next Featured Pic?

The historic Daisy ad helped Lyndon Johnson win a landslide over Barry Goldwater in 1964 and is an important turning point in political and advertising history. The entire full length video is up for Featured Picture! Click here to check it out. – Lionel ^(talk) 09:10, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

Double-crested Cormorant

See discussion on whether to include the alternate colloquial name of "nigger goose", currently disputed. go to Talk:Double-crested_Cormorant#Inclusion_of_colloquial_name_.22nigger_goose.22 Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

Infobox image discussion

You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Filipino American#Lack of images. RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 23:52, 23 July 2012 (UTC)

Subsections of Americans article

You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Americans#NON WHITE HISPANICS(SOME OTHER RACE) or HISPANICS SECTION. RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:00, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

Error on US 2000 Olympics page

Venus Williams won gold in tennis singles, not Serena — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.64.145.190 (talk) 02:18, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

US Flag file coloring concern

I don't know if this has been discussed before, but this has been bugging me for quite some time. The colors on the svg file of the US Flag look faded like they were left in the sun for too long rather than the colors that are found on a flag in good shape. Are we 100% sure the source used gave us the right colors? (I do take notice it could just be my monitor, however after calibrating it several times, I don't think it is.) CRRaysHead90 | ^{Get Some!} 14:07, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

Looks fine to me.--Dcheagle | GO TEAM USA 23:25, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

For me the blue does look faded and the red seems off. But that's just my option on my monitor. Vegaswikian (talk) 05:08, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

There are a few different color definitions, as listed at Flag of the United States#Colors? We could verify which set of colors that the SVG is using and change it as necessary, assuming there's a "correct" set of colors to use. Takes about 5 minutes to download the file, update it and replace it. Imzadi 1979 → 05:35, 29 July 2012 (UTC)

Looking over the file history over at Commons, the colors were changes to this after a discussion on the talk page for Falg of the United States in 2010. I went back and found it here. If I wasn't unavailable at the time I would have brought up this problem. CRRaysHead90 | ^{Get Some!} 19:27, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Ok, after reading most of the discussion and scanning other parts of it, it seems the dispute was never really settled with one user fighting for the pantones to the bitter end and he was dismissed as trolling. So I think it's time to resume the debate officially and try and settle this, because the colors don't look right on a computer display. I shall inform the main practitioners in that debate. CRRaysHead90 | ^{Get Some!} 19:59, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Every computer display is different, so you’re bound to get some variation from one to another. I recommend downloading the image, opening it up in Photoshop on any computer with a well-characterized display (ideally, use a hardware device for this), and assigning sRGB as the image’s color profile. Alternately, you could try to find a display that is natively as close to sRGB as possible, and then looking again. One example of such a display is the recently released iPad. I arrived at the current colors based on fairly extensive research, and was extremely technically careful to convert color values from the official specifications, as described on the image pages and old commons discussions. Unless you have some specific technical or historical evidence why my work there was incorrect, there’s no reason to change it. One issue you may be running into: many mass-produced flags do not actually match each-other or the specified cloth colors, as can easily be verified by visual inspection or by measurement. Based on these flags and pop culture depictions, you may have an inaccurate idea of what the official flag colors are supposed to look like. Finally, bear in mind that color and color vision are complex, and depend on numerous factors. It’s very hard to make a single precise depiction of a color from one medium in another, and factors like what colors are surrounding your computer make a surprisingly large difference in the color you’ll see. Put the same image on a white background or a middle gray background or a black background, and it will look different in each case. The first thing to try though is making sure you have a well calibrated computer display, and are working in a color managed software environment. –jacobolus (t) 21:45, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

One more thing: you can easily find the official documents which specify the colors, online, and if you want, I’m happy to send copies of the JOSA paper where those colors are given precise measurements. You’ll want to consult a color scientist for advice about how to convert those to sRGB. –jacobolus (t) 21:55, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Seeing no responses here, I’m assuming you folks are in agreement and are through with the discussion. I’m going to stop tracking this page, but if a conversation starts back up, feel free to ping me on my talk page and I’ll check back in. –jacobolus (t) 11:06, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Invitation to comment

Hi,

This is an invitation to "United States" members to comment on my proposal for a "Westerns" WikiProject to deal specifically with articles regarding Western movies and Western TV series', major Western actors, directors and people involved in this vast genre over the past century. This is for the fictional Wild West – such as Hollywood's re-imagining of the Old West – so not a historical project. Comments, ideas and further support appreciated. Thanks. — Ma®©usBritish^[chat] 12:24, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals/Westerns

Roanoke, Virginia Obama speech

You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Barack Obama#Article idea. RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:43, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Missy Franklin

FYI Talk:Missy Franklin is currently discussing issues concerning people with dual citizenships, in this case, Canada and USA -- 70.50.151.36 (talk) 08:04, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

Comments by NiD.29

You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Military history of the United States. RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 16:35, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

mermaids

I want to know more about the documentary I saw on Animal Planet. It was extremely moving, but not quite convincing to me,although,I believe anything is possible. I would like to know if the scientists from NOAA are legit, or is this just another way to invite fallacies into everyone's heads? I firmly believe the government will go towards any lengths to dispell this is true. I also believe that it may "tie into" alien intiatives within the ocean environment. Is there a connection,or is it a separate issue altogether? SOS — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lori anthos (talk • contribs) 21:25, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

Just wondering

Is there any particular reason why this project doesn't have a collaboration with WikiProject Florida? I mean, it would make sense if two project collaborated. Steel1943 (talk) 02:59, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

We tried but several members of the Florida project vehemently opposed any collaboration for the Florida projects, even the Inactive/defunct ones. Kumioko (talk) 11:04, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

More opportunities for editors to access free research databases!

The quest for getting Wikipedia editors the sources they need for articles related to the United States and other subjects is gaining momentum. Here's what's happening and what you can sign up for right now:

• Credo Reference provides full-text online versions of nearly 1200 published reference works from more than 70 publishers in every major subject, including general and subject dictionaries and encyclopedias. There are 125 full Credo 350 accounts available, with access even to 100 more references works than in Credo's original donation. All you need is a 1-year old account with 1000 edits. Sign up here.
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• Questia is an online research library for books and journal articles focusing on the humanities and social sciences. Questia has curated titles from over 300 trusted publishers including 77,000 full-text books and 4 million journal, magazine, and newspaper articles, as well as encyclopedia entries. There will soon be 1000 full access 1-year accounts available. All you need is a 1-year old account with 1000 edits. Sign up here.

In addition to these great partnerships, you might be interested in the next-generation idea to create a central Wikipedia Library where approved editors would have access to all participating resource donors. It's still in the preliminary stages, but if you like the idea, add your feedback to the Community Fellowship proposal to start developing the project. Drop by the talk page of User:Ocaasi, who is overseeing these projects, if you have any questions.--JayJasper (talk) 17:46, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Could Some People Here Please Take a Look at this Article and Try to Improve it?

List of United States Presidential autobiographies. I created this article, but no one seems to be editing or improving it, which is disappointing considering that this article has a great purpose. Thank you. Futurist110 (talk) 01:05, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

A-Class review process for WikiProject United States

There has been some discussion on my talk page in the last few days about getting an A-Class review process going for WikiProject United States. There are a few of us already interested but I wanted to start a discussion here to give the rest of the project a chance to comment before building the infrastructure. Does anyone have any opinion about this project developing an A-Class review process? Here are a few thoughts I have about it:

1. WikiProject Military history has a very good process we could use as a starting point. We may need to tailor a few things for this project but its a solid start.
2. Should US related projects outside those supported by WPUS be able to submit?
3. Should we use the existing WikiProject template to identify A-Class process or create new templates for tracking it?
4. I will drop a note on the supported projects talk pages in the next couple days with a link to this discussion.

Please let us know if you have any questions or comments about this proposal. Kumioko (talk) 23:51, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

I notified all 103 of the supported/joint projects of the discussion. Kumioko (talk) 02:31, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

As someone who regularly uses the MILHIST review process for folks who only served a few years in the military and then went on to have long political careers, I'd hate to see us restrict who could submit. If it has a clear relationship to the US, I think we should allow it to be submitted. I know WP:USA has sometimes had a difficult relationship with projects that don't want to be supported, so being inclusive here could be something of an olive branch, where being exclusive could further an us-versus-them mentality that I think we want to steer clear of. Acdixon ^{(talk · contribs)} 13:41, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

I think that's right; people can get rowdy if they see you as trying to exlude them from FAC, and A-class won't work unless it's a place that helps people succeed at FAC. A-class can't be as tough as FAC (otherwise, why do it at all?), but if A-class reviewers give significantly different answers than FAC reviewers give, then A-class will just be setting people up for failure. So: I think A-class is only going to work if we can convince people who know something about consensus at FAC to participate. We'll see. - Dank (push to talk) 13:57, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

I also agree with the above comments. I think Milhist has a good process in place, are their any other active A-Class reviews that anyone is aware of? Kumioko (talk) 14:04, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

WP:HWY/ACR covers WP:USRD, WP:CRWP, WP:UKRD and the rest of the Highways Project, although most of the nominations come from USRD or the Ontario subproject at CRWP. (It had been hosted at USRD with a clone at CRWP before they were merged and moved to HWY.) The pace of reviews is a bit slower (14 days is the minimum, but a couple months is the norm), but the reviews tend to be friendly and thorough. The goal has always been at that ACR to prepare articles for possible FACs, although not all A-Class articles are intended for further review in all cases. Imzadi 1979 → 18:10, 13 August 2012 (UTC)

Defining the requirements to meet A-class status seems to me to be maybe the biggest hurdle here. And it would certainly help if the A-class review had some sort of clear indications as to what would and would not be eligible. Here I'm thinking of, for instance, articles on maybe US sports temas, like in the Olympics and Davis Cup, maybe competing overseas. Would they qualify for this A-class review or not? Otherwise, I think it would be a great idea if it can be started. I used to do some A-Class review with WikiProject Biography some years ago, and I know that, at the time, it was hard to necessarily review the content of some of the articles relative to other reference sources, but that might be a bit easier now. I might not be the best possible candidate for a reviewer, but if this does take off let me know and I can at least try to help where and if I can. John Carter (talk) 00:00, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

I have a pretty liberal of US related so to me the answer would be yes. Personally the process is to improve the article not about turf wars with some other project who might get their feelings hurt because we are encroaching on their articles. Any help would be appreciated no matter how insignificant it might seem. Even just grazing it over for basic typos and grammar (I have been accused of being bad at the latter, myself). I hope the discussion generates more interest though, after three days we only have a couple comments so that's not really a good sign. Four editors IMO aren't enough to do something like this. IMO we should have at least ten to start even if they only do some minor things each. Kumioko (talk) 00:07, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

The rules over at WikiProject Biography when I was involved in their A-Class was to have two approvals by regular reviewers, and, honestly, I only remember the number of such reviewers never getting much higher than three at any given time. Four could work, if they were willing to do a lot of work. Maybe it would be a good idea to leave comments over at the GA and FA pages requesting maybe some help from knowledgable editors there, and maybe add something to the Signpost asking for other reviewers. But, remember school is just about ready to start, or locally here just started this past Monday, and I think a lot of people may be tied up with that for a while. I definitely think giving this at least a week or two more to see if there is more interest, and, yeah, maybe asking some US editors at GA and FA to help out if they can. John Carter (talk) 00:31, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment/A-Class criteria says that any two reviewers can support promotion to A-Class on the article's talk page absent a formalized process. WP:HWY (and USRD, CRWP, etc) requires four reviewers. If you can cross pollinate with other projects to tap into potential reviewers, then I'd set the bar a little higher than two, especially if there isn't a deadline on reviews. Imzadi 1979 → 00:51, 15 August 2012 (UTC)

(ec)I agree that it could work with only 4 and frankly I have no problems doing the work of setting up the process. I'm probably not going to be too actively involved in it after that though, my plans are to start cutting back my time on WP significantly and attending to more things in real life although I have said that before. I think my soon to fail RFA was just the nudge I needed although I admit I feel to vested at this point to just up and quite and walk away. I also agree that adding notices to the GA and FA (also FL and possibly peer review IMO) would be good. I already left notices on all of the projects supported by the banner. I didn't notify any of the others though. If someone thinks we should let me know. Due to some hard feelings between some and WPUS in the past I don't want to do it of my own accord but if folks here think we should I'd be glad to do the work. I'll leave the discussion here as long as needed.

@Imzadi. Thank you for the help in this discussion. I personally think 2-3 is perfectly fine but I will defer to the groups judgement on how many are required. Kumioko (talk) 00:57, 15 August 2012 (UTC)