Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article

Wells Cathedral

It's too late to do much about it now, but I think Wells Cathedral has issues which mean it shouldn't have been made TFA; I've raised some of these in a discussion on its talk page. It doesn't look like a vast amount of discussion took place here, and although @750h+ and @Serial Number 54129 mentioned issues and @Z1720 resolved to fix them, nobody seems to have checked that this had been completed before the article was approved.

The intent of this isn't to blame any editors in particular, and in fact I think a lot of work did go into the article in the run-up to today. It just seems worth flagging up this as an example of an article that wasn't quite up to scratch slipping through the cracks. A.D.Hope (talk) 22:22, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

That's a bit doubtful; imo the main problem was Z1720 extremely brutal "fixing", which the main author rather understandably reverted wholesale. If you're working on this sort of subject, you need to grasp the difference between art/architectural criticism and "promotional language". Some editors have difficulty doing this. Johnbod (talk) 18:23, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

@Johnbod: My edits to the article were reverted before this was TFA. It is not my version of the article that the editor thinks was not "up to scratch", so it's hard for me to agree that my edits caused the concerns. Z1720 (talk) 22:45, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

Ok, I didn't check the chrono, so apologies if this is the case. Johnbod (talk) 03:22, 5 November 2024 (UTC)

New coordinator

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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As some of you may be aware, Dank has had to step back for health-related issues. We're hopeful that he can come back. In the interim, SchroCat has helped us, scheduling October and writing a large number of blurbs, and we'd like the community's approval to make him a coordinator. Dank will continue to be a coordinator, though somewhat on sabbatical right now. If he can return, we will each schedule a month in four, which would be welcome because it's a fair amount of work, if not, we'll either continue on with three schedulers or see if we can find someone else. Do we have the community's approval for SchroCat to join us as a coordinator? Wehwalt (talk) 17:54, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

• Support thanks for stepping up SchroCat. Z1720 (talk) 17:56, 2 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support, October was a fine job. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 17:58, 2 November 2024 (UTC)
• Appointments are retroactive nowadays, Wehwalt. SerialNumber54129 17:59, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

  I've always felt strongly that the community needs to give approval, whether initially, or when being given permanent status. Wehwalt (talk) 18:20, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

  Agreed. - Dank (push to talk) 21:49, 2 November 2024 (UTC)

• Support, they are doing good work. Hog Farm _Talk 18:22, 2 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support, great quality work. Stephen 22:27, 2 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support, thanks Schro. Graham Beards (talk) 11:18, 4 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support, with thanks to SchroCat. Schwede66 14:52, 4 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support SC has been an asset across the featured content processes, no concerns. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 15:47, 4 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support. SchroCat is definitely an eminent, prolific and highly-respected Wikipedian, familiar with FA norms.  — Amakuru (talk) 15:58, 4 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support – Sorry to hear that Dank has health problems, and I hope he'll be on the mend soon. SchroCat is a valued personal friend of mine in real life, but I think I can with clear conscience add my support here. I don't envy him (or his colleagues) the role of coordinator, but he can be relied on to be clear-eyed and fair. Tim riley talk 17:15, 4 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support - a very full appreciation of all aspects of the FAC process makes SchroCat a very suitable candidate. Best wishes to Dank for a swift recovery. KJP1 (talk) 18:14, 4 November 2024 (UTC)
  • Thanks, Tim and KJP. I'm out of danger, but I won't be running marathons anytime soon. - Dank (push to talk) 15:29, 5 November 2024 (UTC)
    • Dear me! This sounds dreadfully serious. My very best wishes, Dank, for your return to match fitness. Tim riley talk 15:39, 5 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support. Thanks for the good work! -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:17, 4 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support! Panini! • 🥪 18:40, 4 November 2024 (UTC)
• Support They have already started doing it and I haven't seen any problems. QuicoleJR (talk) 20:27, 4 November 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

January TFAs

The January 2025 schedule can now be found here. Nominations are still welcome; changes can still be made if necessary. - SchroCat (talk) 09:41, 22 November 2024 (UTC)

moratorium on Alexander McQueen collections

(OK, trying a different venue; is this the right one?)

Can we please stop sending up articles on individual Alexander McQueen collections as TFA? At least for a while? It seems like a super-niche area and we've seen a bunch of them recently; not sure how to efficiently collect stats, but I feel like today's is at least the third in a year or so. --Trovatore (talk) 04:42, 13 December 2024 (UTC)

TFA selection is tricky enough as it is without binding our hands any further. We struggle to show sufficient variety as it is and nance gluts if unused FAs in some areas (milhist and modern music) and a dearth in multiple areas (See here for the large areas of shortfall). Sure, we can ignore new, fresh FAs from an under-represented topic and run more milhist or music, or we can rerun even more older FAs (which carries with it a whole set of other risks and problems), but that’s going to lead to many more complaints. It would also be unfair on the editors involved in getting these to FA if we deliberately ignore them without a good rationale. (BTW, I’ve already scheduled another McQueen article for late January). - SchroCat (talk) 05:06, 13 December 2024 (UTC)

Well, but clearly McQueen is a massively overrepresented topic in FA, don't you think? I would like to see more from math and science; those are underrepresented (partly because it's incredibly difficult to write a technical article to FA standards, so fair enough if there just aren't enough articles, but when they do come up I think they should take precedence over McQueen). --Trovatore (talk) 05:10, 13 December 2024 (UTC)

Society and culture is already an under-represented area at FAC, so reducing our output in that area isn’t a great option unless we increase the over-represented areas further, at which point we’ll have even more complaints to deal with. Please feel free to make life easier by adding FAs from different areas that can be used instead! - SchroCat (talk) 05:18, 13 December 2024 (UTC)

I sort of get that "society and culture" generally might also be a little underrepresented (though not as much as math and science) but I struggle to understand how this constant repetition of McQueen is improving "variety" in articles. --Trovatore (talk) 05:31, 13 December 2024 (UTC)

As I explained, we have a very limited pot of FAs we can put the MP. If we stop something where we do have ‘stock’, it has to be replaced by one of the areas which are already overrepresented (milhist or modern music), which reduces variety and raises complaints. As I’ve said, please write FAs from the large areas where there is a shortfall! - SchroCat (talk) 06:13, 13 December 2024 (UTC)

Trovatore, I’m sure everyone has heard your point. It’s time to move on. Schwede66 06:53, 13 December 2024 (UTC)

Date formats

Greetings of the season from New Zealand, or Meri Kirihimete as we tend to say here.

You may recall the report at Errors a couple of days ago about date formats of the Tomb of Antipope John XXIII article. Here's a copy of it:

“ We should use DMY date format rather than MDY, to match the format of the article featured. GiantSnowman 08:33, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

But that article uses mdy format!? Schwede66 09:03, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

It doesn't anymore - MDY is not the Italian format, I have changed to DMY. All the related articles are already DMY. GiantSnowman 09:26, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

Whilst I really don't like messing with FAs, the date format change in the target article hasn't been challenged, hence I've implemented the change here as well. Schwede66 23:12, 22 December 2024 (UTC)

”

Today, we have the same situation, with the 1964 Brinks Hotel bombing being in mdy format when it should be dmy. I've posted about it on the article's talk page as a justification for changing it to dmy. As yet, I haven't touched what is on the main page. Two queries:

• In this specific case, is it ok to tweak the date format in the TFA?
• More importantly, should the schedulers as part of the normal process check whether the date format is possibly in need of updating?

As always, your good work is much appreciated. Schwede66 01:28, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

No and no. Nikkimaria (talk) 02:02, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

Per Nikkimaria. Gog the Mild (talk) 09:00, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

I think people interested in the date format of FAs should speak up at FAC and leave TFA alone. And I agree that this is not work that the TFA schedulers should be doing. —Kusma (talk) 10:31, 24 December 2024 (UTC)

It doesn't anymore - MDY is not the Italian format, I have changed to DMY. reminds me of Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)/Archive 193#MOS on date format by country and Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers/Archive 162#DATETIES vs. DATEVAR/DATERET, where that argument was rejected (and the MOS was updated to clarify "English-speaking country" in both places). Sad to see GiantSnowman is still pushing it anyway. Anomie⚔ 14:32, 24 December 2024 (UTC)