Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles/1911 verification

message: The guidelines here only refer to checking if the content is up to date. While we're at going through all 11,000 articles again, wouldn't it make sense to put a quick note on each WP article's talk page as to the status of it relative to the EB article? The most important thing I can think of is is our article as complete/comprehensive. If the EB article had 5kb of text and ours is 1kb, we certainly didn't do as good a job in being comprehensive. Now of course some things EB covered we don't need to, but we should at least note it on the talk page. In any case verifying completeness wouldn't be much more work. Any other ideas for things ver important to check while we're at it? - Taxman Talk 23:24, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article comprehensiveness 

message: The below items were verified prior to the reorganization and the changes could not be easily reincorporated.  Where possible please update the status on the appropriate page. --Reflex Reaction (talk)• 16:02, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Verified items

message: I propose that the articles be verified by more than one person to help avoid careless work or work that is poor because the editor does not know or understand what needs to be done, which is why we need to do this verification in the first place. 
One option would be to place articles in a "proposed verified" list. The article would have to be removed by a second editor after verifying the article. Having the original and one to three other editors signing their names next to the article would be another option. Also, the article would have to stay in the list for a certain period of time, at least a week, perhaps more if there are a lot of articles to go through. Editors would be strongly encouraged to give a descriptive edit summary or a note on the talk page explaining the sources that they checked and the changes they made, or if no changes were necessary. There is a question of what to expect from the later editors. I suggest they at least read the article to get a feel for whether its information may be out of date or inaccurate and check at least one source. Besides verifying other information, checking a source will help identify many of the topics that now have different names or are not properly accented. A list of things that are very likely to be out of date could be given to editors for this, such as the population of a city and its main industries.
I am open to different ideas, but I think it is important that some type of double-checking occurs. Otherwise we will have the same problems we had with the previous project. -- Kjkolb 08:55, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Double-checking

message: I think that there should be a list of articles that are proposed for deletion. Articles should not be removed from the list or deleted unless there is a consensus to do so. There was such as list when the articles were being added, but apparently all of them were eventually added, anyway. I don't think that the articles should be taken to Articles for Deletion on a case-by-case basis. People tend to have strong feelings about whether or not to include an article from the 1911 EB. If they don't think that we have done our homework and/or we don't make a very persuasive case for deletion, they will likely vote keep without doing much checking into the articles themselves. Once a bad article has survived AfD because of a poor nomination, it will be much harder to delete it. Some editors will vote keep simply based on the previous decision. The default is and should be to keep articles, but when it is from the 1911 EB, there is too much reluctance for deletion.
I have two suggestions for how to handle deletions. The first is that the nominations are done in batches or individually on AfD, with specific explanations given in the nomination and a short summary of a longer, generic explanation, with a link to the full explanation. The second is that a decision to keep or delete is reached within the project, also with a thorough and specific explanation. The generic explanation may be unnecessary, especially if the specific one is thorough, but I think that it is a good backup and eliminates the need to state certain cases for deletion over and over again. If one is not used, perhaps a boilerplate nomination should be available, with the reasons for deleting the specific article added to it. One important thing to mention is that the text will still be available online at the two commercial sites and a version verified for accuracy to the original is being made on Wikisource. Again, I am open to other ideas. -- Kjkolb 08:55, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed deletion list

message: Some of you may find the suggestions overly complicated or burdensome and I am willing to use a different system. However, our process for working with these articles needs to change. The quality of some of the articles is just awful. They are out of date, have the wrong name, are inaccurate, racist or no longer exist (common for districts, states and provinces). The first and most important reason for verification is to have accurate information in articles. Another reason is to avoid deletion of good articles with the bad by a group of admins fed up with the inaccurate articles or by Jimbo after an embarrassing news story on one or more of the articles (some of the articles are almost as bad as negro, though not as long). I would say that this is unlikely, but not out of the question. -- Kjkolb 08:55, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Need

message: Here's a template that may help: . Sometimes you'll find a Wikipedia article that is obviously deficient, and it has a decent 1911 article. If the 1911 info should be included into the Wikipedia article, and you don't feel like doing it right now, just put  on the talk page, and that adds the article to :Category:Articles needing improvement from EB1911. Then someone who feels like it can go through those and add 1911 info to the article. What do you think? Useful? – Quadell (talk) (bounties) 13:34, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it is useful. Can a link to the jrank version be added? -- Kjkolb 19:17, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, any URL will work. – Quadell (talk) (bounties) 20:49, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  New template for verification 

message: I alluded to this before, but I wanted to put a marker down here. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition article, EB1911 has 40,000 articles. We started the project with a list of 11,000 or 14,000 (I remember both numbers). I assume Bogdan kicked us off by taking the complete list of 40,000 and removing all the blues in one swell foop. Among those 26,000 (or 29,000) must be many articles where the WP entry is about a different topic from the EB entry, and more (probably many more) where it is less comprehensive - in those cases, the  template is appropriate.
In theory, it'd be nice one day to wade through that 26,000 list and check.
But I agree with the sense of the apparently few people still paying attention to EB1911: the most important task is to fix the really bad cases of uncritical inclusion (hence the  suggestion), and revisit the reappearing redlinks. Yes, I'm back. David Brooks 05:31, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Hope that I too would be welcomed back to this project, considering my earlier fiasco (way back in January 2006) in dealing with these articles. I feel that I have a sense of responsibility in verifying these article as well. Additionally, I agree with you that it would be a good idea to go through the other 26 000 articles as well.  --Siva1979Talk to me 19:14, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The other 26,000 articles 

message: LoveToKnow has been wikified and is now accepting both corrections and updates. Jrank.org also accepts updates. Both claim copyright, so both should be considered tainted. See more at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles#1911encylopedia.org wikified. David Brooks 14:49, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  User submissions to the online 1911 versions 

message: I estimate that this project will take until the year 2043 at the present rate; see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Missing encyclopedic articles#Status of 1911 verification project for more details. David Brooks 05:49, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Now that I've finished page B, there's another update; see Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Missing_encyclopedic_articles#1911_verification:_page_B1_done_and_some_musings. David Brooks (talk) 22:24, 20 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Status of the project 

message: Am considering shrinking the pages down to ~200 per page, along the lines of the Mythology, Art and History of Ideas Hotlists.  Will hold off until I can get a second opinion. Eyeball kid (talk) 20:21, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Shrinkage

message: The  after each entry on the lists was intended to help users create any redlinked articles, and as a secondary goal to beef up stubs. It seems that, by now, almost all legitimate articles have at least some presence in Wikipedia, and remaining redlinks are mostly typos. On the other hand, the 500 or template calls, each generating 11 links, bog down the page, and currently the rendering breaks down in a mysterious way, usually around #285 of the list. I doubt anyone is using these links. If nobody objects (is anyone listening?) I'll systematically replace them with a single google link. David Brooks (talk) 18:27, 17 October 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Since the fix to  in November, both page rendering and the load on the browser are much cheaper (the equivalent of using , in fact). So I'll leave them as is. David Brooks (talk) 20:20, 1 January 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  remove the search template