Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/archive15

message: I'd like to announce the opening of the Featured Music Project, an attempt to encourage and facilitate successful featured article candidacies and peer reviews for articles on musicians and bands.  You can help by evaluating articles, or by working on the articles that are already close to being ready for FAC. Tuf-Kat 19:28, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Featured Music Project 

message: Would it save some reviewing work if we were to add something up at the nominating procedure section that says, "The most common criticism of articles proposed for FA status is lack of inline citations," or something to that effect?  (Assuming that this is in fact the most common objection).  I haven't been following this page all that long, but it does seem to be a common problem, and even though it is explicitly mentioned at FA criteria, maybe we should emphasize it more.  Kaisershatner 20:05, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Good idea... I'm sure we can come up with a list of the most common crits to add to the top (contributors are more likely to read it than WP:WIAFA). I'd say very common crits are: refs, lead section, length (esp. too long) and flow/structure... Mikkerpikker ... 20:19, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's already been done (twice) and is already linked from WIAFA. Raul654 20:21, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

text: And, no, I'd prefer not putting it here when the criteria are already linked (twice) from the top of the article. Raul654 20:23, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Those links are quite interesting, haven't read them before... I see your point but I do think Kaisershatner has a case - I've seen a couple of FA nominators who have not read WIAFA. It seems likely a "how to avoid common mistakes" link would be read more regularly than WIAFA because it will appear to be more utilitarian & "juicy". That said, I don't feel particularly strongly about this... just my 1/2 cent worth... Mikkerpikker ... 20:31, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Raul, I respect your preferences and I'm just trying to help.  I'm not suggesting the criterion is currently underemphasized, just that it appears to me if it is being stated in a way that lots of people find easy to ignore.  Listing it as the last point under how to submit a candidate would (IMO) make it unavoidable.  Since around 10 of the 30 articles currently listed, and a high proportion of the "oppose" candidates, currently suffer from this flaw, my guess is that it would save labor to signpost this there, but I could be wrong, and in any case, you're the boss.  If I were you, I'd try it this way as an experiment, but I'm not you(!!).  Best,  Kaisershatner 19:46, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Here's what I don't understand - if people don't read the instructions in the simpler form as they already exist, why you think adding more will make nominators more likely to read them? Raul654 19:49, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

text: If you are citing specific numbers, then yes, you probably should be citing a specific source. Raul654 06:46, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Raul, I have to apologize, since my goal is to create less work and here I am wasting even more of your time with this.  My thesis is that the high proportion of FA nominees that do not comply with the WP:CITE requirement indicates that the current configuration of FA recommended criteria are written or presented in a way that enables people to ignore them.  An alternative explanation is that no number of warnings or advice will prevent people from barreling through without meeting the criteria, but my view is that a more explicit emphasis on CITE, nearer to the "submit here" instructions, would cut the CITE violations down.  But like I said, I could be wrong, and you may not wish to experiment with the process.  Or it may not be enough of a bother to warrant a change in the instructions.  Again, sorry to take up your time with this, I'm just trying to help. :)  Kaisershatner 14:18, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Is it true that embedded links are an acceptable substitution for footnotes? Gflores Talk 18:24, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No. They do not provide the date accessed, which is an important indicator so we can tell what the precise contents of the document cited were when it was accessed. Johnleemk | Talk 18:27, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've seen several articles with little or no inline citations, but have several book references. Are inline citation required then? Gflores Talk 02:13, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If by that you mean articles which just have a list of books at the end, then I would think that's more or less useless.  What we need is some sort of indication which material in the article comes from which source.  That indication could be Harvard referencing, or it could be ref tags- whatever floats your boat. Markyour words 02:37, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Common criticisms 

message: How long should you wait before adding an article to FAC if it's received no replies at all on peer review? I ask because I've had Sydney Newman on PR since Monday, and nobody has shown any sign of responding to it. I have managed to get a couple of fellow Wikipedians to look at the article after I specifically requested them to, but I was wondering if I should give up on anyone finding it on PR now it's slipped so far down the page and just add it to FAC now? Angmering 22:57, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Feel free and move it any time, if PR isn't proving productive. —Bunchofgrapes  (talk) 23:44, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, I shall do that. Cheers. Angmering 23:47, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Quick question

message: I seriously do not understand HTML, and have no clue how to attempt to nominate a article. So I was wondering if someone else could do it for me. Who ever does, thank you very much
. the article in question is They Might Be Giants. No, I am not being lazy, I'm just ignorant, thanks again. -Cody Schmidt
19:11, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: With all respect, I don't think the article would pass. It hasn't been peer reviewed, and was removed from the Good Articles list for lack of references. I suggest you request a peer review and work on adding inline citations first. If you need help with requesting a peer review, just ask. --Pagrashtak 03:05, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Help me out here

message: Noticed it was nominated as a candidate by a guest, and promptly undone.  Had a look at the article and it seemed rational for it to be featured.  Not arsed greatly either way, but I think the nomination shouldve remained, the fact that a guest nominated it should be of no significance imho.  And no it wasn't me! --PopUpPirate 00:46, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: According to , the link was red, so it was right of anyone to remove the addition. However, I would like to add that while WP:MAC is welcome to start or help a FAC, they have no right to take it down because "they" do not feel it is ready yet. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) Fair use policy  01:55, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Apple Computers 

message: Some measure of talk page length or use may be useful as a measure of how well discussed an article is -- rather than being the impressively-arrayed (but potentially biased) ideas of a single primary talented (but potentially biased or directed) author.
:The talk page of any truly high-quality article should be longer than the article itself, from the extensive discussion about what material to include, how to ensure that all important aspects are covered, verification of the contents, negotiation about how to appropriately represent different points of view, building of consensus over disputed points, etc. In all likelihood, there would be enough discussion that we'd already have archived it a time or two. Perhaps we should make this a requirement for featured article status. --Michael Snow 22:18, 8 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Not even close, actually.  This is particularly true for articles on more obscure subjects, which sometimes are the "ideas of a single primary... author". —Kirill Lokshin 22:57, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

text: There are some articles where the talk page is a red link until the Peer review or FAC process starts, so I also like to suggest that this is a very, very bad idea. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) Fair use policy  23:16, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Talk page length as criterion? 

message: How about having a (required for FA) General references section (General+Other/Notes), where one or a few main sources that cover most of the material in an article, are listed. This would seem to have a couple of advantages over the non-structured approach. First, it is easier to check/discuss/debate the general verifiability of an article by having the core sources clearly indicated and available to be critiqued. Second, for some people at least, it automatically gives an article more credibility (references perceived as more comprehensive, comprehensible, accessible, than having only dozens or more pinpoint citations). I haven't thought through the various types of articles, but it seems flexible enough to apply across subject areas and article levels within them. And, even if an article were to be built from dozens of different, non-overlapping sources, there seems likely to be some source where the general principles of the topic are discussed, so finding that as part of the writing process can't be bad. And there's always special case flexibility, if some odd case comes up... --Tsavage 22:42, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Idea/suggestion: General References section

message: Does Wikipedia have a bias against certain topics? If I am wrong, someone please correct me. I recently nominated my article 1996 campaign finance scandal to the FAC page only to have it dumped in the archive only 5 days after submitting it. Other articles have remained on the FAC page for up to two weeks. I originally received 3 objections, but managed to convert 2 of them to "support". What is up with that? The article was removed by  Raul654. I sent him a message asking him his reasoning, but he has neglected to respond to me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jayzel68 (talk • contribs) 
:Raul is an administrator, a bureaucrat and an arbitrator so he's a pretty busy guy. I'm sure he'll respond as soon as he can. Mikker ... 18:13, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: ...not to mention a graduate student with Real Life Problems (TM) that occasionally demand a lot of my time (like a project due this monday). Anyhow, I've restored the nomination. Raul654 02:23, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Isn't 5 days normal for most articles?  Some stay longer but most discussions just last 5 days.  I think you want to be a bit more careful about accusing the system of being biased - you appear to have jumped to this conclusion based only on your unfamiliarity with the process.  Worldtraveller 15:13, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unresponsive administrators 

message: Is it a requirement that references be in a smaller font? Or is it just general practice or something. Is it okay to object based on references being in a smaller font size? Making the references smaller is bad for accessibility reasons and visually diminishes their prominence, IMO. Miss Madeline | Talk to Madeline 17:55, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, smaller font sizes is not a requirement, it is something of a general practice. I agree with you that font sizes can be too small (it should be at least 85% IMO) but I don't think you should object to a FA candidate based solely on the size of its ref font. Just enlarge it yourself (I've done this many times & I've never seen a complaint about such a change). Alternatively, simply recommend enlargement. Mikker ... 18:07, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe the practice developed as a result of concern that the "Notes" and "References" sections were getting too large.  Another approach would be to avoid adding references to every sentence, [1] and clause [1] but it seems very much the vogue[2] [3] today[4]. -- ALoan (Talk) 19:39, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: With the new citing format, we could help compress the size of the references by compressing repeating references to 1abc, etc. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) Fair use policy  20:32, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

text: I don't know that it's so bad for accessibility reasons. Don't most web browsers allow you to specify a minimum font size to use? –Joke 19:44, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Agreed. What on earth is the problem with notes and references looking large? If an article needs references, it needs references. Pcb21 Pete 11:39, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reference Font Size 

message: With all of the focus on inline, pinpoint citations, I think that it should be practice for every FAC  to have its references checked. At least one reviewing editor should state, "I've checked out the references, and they...check out." Online sources can certainly be directly verified. Books and other media may be more difficult, but at least their existence can be verified. What I'm suggesting is that, TO A REASONABLy THOROUGH DEGREE, references be EXPLICITLY vouched for for each FAC (especially considering the additional FA requirement of inline citations). Otherwise, we're only paying lip service to WP:V, by accepting appearances as reality (I can point out several recent FACs, some promoted, where checking the refs pointed up serious problems, including blatant misrepresentations of the source material, scholarly disputes, and more.) --Tsavage 06:11, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: In principle, I support a requirement for some formal references validation during the peer review and/or FA promotion. However, I am unsure if all the references could be checked without significantly increasing the time an article spends in the review phase --- some may be in different languages, some only available online by subscription, etc. Finally, this borders on not assuming good faith. What wouldn't hurt for sure, is a suggestion for the reviewers on the PR/FAC reviews to VOLUNTARY list the refs (or maybe the approximate percentage of the refs present in the article) that they've checked. If this works reasonably well, later a requirement in the spirit of what you've suggested might be worked out. --BACbKA 10:04, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The best bet would be to do FAC review sitting at a university library, since a lot of these FACs use text book refereces.  The trouble is, I do a lot of my reviewing during spare moments between work... which makes things tricky.  Fieari 16:38, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

text: I don't know if I'd agree with making it obligatory, but recommended would be nice.  I've often considered coming up with a way to monitor which references have been double-checked, using the talk page. Tuf-Kat 17:16, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Good in theory - in practice, impossible to do. (see also Raul's 3rd law) Raul654 18:41, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

text: I always do this for the online sources before I support any article. I try to use google to verify info that is not in the online references. Very few articles initially pass this test. --maclean25 19:58, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Agree with others. This is very desirable and so, as Tuf-Kat suggests, we should note when it has been done - it is a real bonus for a page. However as Raul points out, we are sadly not in a position such that is going to happen very often just yet thus to make it a FAC requirement now would destroy FAC :(. However I agree we should push verification as a good idea and then one day it can become a FAC requirement. Pcb21 Pete 20:41, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

text: I agree this would be great to encourage, but not a good idea to enforce yet. Tuf-Kat's idea is a very good one, and a smooth system that could indicate the user that verified the source and the citation to it would be very valuable. Ideally it would autolink the the oldid version of the article that contained the verified citation so that later changes to the article wouldn't invalidate the verification. A subpage may work for this for now, but a better system could really help with accuracy in our articles. I considered asking for such a system to be added to m:Cite/Cite.php, but maybe there's a better way to do it. Ideas? - Taxman Talk 16:52, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just a follow up to that, systems to check that citations have been used correctly are part of m:Wikicite that is in the planning stages. m:User:Jleybov, who is proposing the system also is willing and able to implement it. S/he is currently looking for input, but also pitch in on the code if you have the skills. I can't think of much more important to the long run reliability of the project. If we can demonstrate citations have been checked several times and by who, we can finally lift out of our current unreliable state. There's nothing wrong with being a work in progress unless we never take the next steps. - Taxman Talk 17:11, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Checking references as REQUIREMENT for FA promotion

message: How is it that people are always responding to stuff on this?  Its great of you guys, just commending your dedication to making sure articles are great.  Is there a crew of people who frequent this like the help desk, or is it just random who objects?--Urthogie 16:11, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: A little bit of both, methinks. Johnleemk | Talk 16:22, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's for everybody. It's not always the case that an article gets a lot of response; some are left rather in the shade (Olga Rudge recently comes to mind, as an example of a fine and neglected article), while more controversial or "noisy" articles may get a surfeit of attention. If you've got the time and inclination to help, Urthogie, plese read the short instructions for supporting/objecting on the project page, read the slightly longer but pretty manageable FA criteria, and jump in there! Bishonen | ノート 16:33, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  question 

message: The intro section to this page mentions what happens to failed candidates, but not the mechanism by which one can succeed. Is it simply a case someone observing that a candidate has been around for some time and all objections resolved, or is there a more rigorous system involving appeals to the gods? — Steverwanda 16:29, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's mostly a matter of addressing all actionable objections. If an article keeps getting objections, but also keeps getting worked on and the objections change to support, more time can be given. Once an article sits around for a while with objections that haven't been fixed, it gets taken off the list. If it sits for long enough with support, it gets promoted. Kafziel 16:35, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This is a monotheistic system. There is one god, and his name is User:Raul654, and the articles whose every objection hath been resolved come spontaneously unto him to be beatified. Bishonen | ノート 16:39, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: LOL... "The Raul! The Raul decides who will go and who will stay!" Kafziel 16:45, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Um, duh. Although I've never seen such a situation occur. Johnleemk | Talk 17:26, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Don't worry, Urthogie. There are always plenty of us around to object to crap. :) Kafziel 18:04, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Raul654 requires a minimum level of support before an article is beatified (canonised?).  In any event, there is always WP:FARC. -- ALoan (Talk) 19:47, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Just as there seems to be a game amongst wikipedians, known as "Who can revert the vandalism first?" which is highly competitive and often difficult to beat the dedicated players, who I've seen revert vandalism in less than thirty seconds, there's a similar game with featured article candidates.  Being more detailed, more specific, and finding more faults is a competitive sport around here, which accounts for the rising standards for featured articles.  That isn't to say that we don't appreciate articles we don't have to object to... heck, we love those even more, because those articles increase the quality of wikipedia.  But by sturgens law, as mentioned above, it's been pretty constant that roughly 90% of what comes through FAC isn't ready, and with those articles, nitpicking can be fun, and beneficial. Heck, because of our nitpicking, many of these articles then get improved, and become featured, so that can only be seen as a good thing! Fieari 19:14, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

text: Urthogie - I'm honestly not sure what would happen. There's a lot of good article reviewers on the FAC, and your question presumes that all of them drop the ball at the same time. It's an unlikely scenario to say the least. I assume that when I review a nomination, and it gets a bunch of supports - particularly from the people I know are good reviewers - then I trust that they know what they are talking about. Raul654 19:20, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Here is a situation that is not hypothetical,  one non  actionable objection is raised, (which really was silly) no other necessary criteria are missing (Peer review is not essential) or was the disinterest shown to this page just a one off.  Please no-one feel the urge to re-nominate it - I haven't the time or inclination right now, it's just that it seems to me a bit tough to have FAC failed on a talk page that has not truly been FAC'd.  Yep, I know I just write boring pages! - but at least they make me happy.  I just wonder if any other page has had similar treatment and if others think the resultant FAC failed is fair - had she been a stripper - who knows? Giano | talk 19:40, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd say that's a great example of why peer reviews are important. They're not required, but that objection would have been dealt with in the peer review instead of the FAC, and you would have had all the time in the world to fix it (or not fix it, as the case may be). Not a bad looking article, by the way. Kafziel 19:46, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

text: That's actually the converse of the situation Urthogie asked about. Urthogie asked if there had been a situation where an article was promoted when it shouldn't have been (a 'false positive', what in statistics is called a type 1 error). I know of no such case. A false negative - an article that wasn't promoted when it should have been (statistical type 2 error) - has been known to happen occasionally. I know, for example, that several times Johnleemk nominated music-related articles that were more-or-less ignored. No one opposed, but few (if any) supported either - so I didn't feel comfortable promoting. While uncommon, it's not an unknown occurance either. Raul654 19:49, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  How does an article pass from candidate to featured? 

message: has been nominated for deletion. It just occured to me that I should mention it here, as the use of the template is directly affected by FAC outcomes. Pagrashtak 03:01, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Template:GAF nominated for deletion 

message: This article is extremely close to FA status.  It has had two peer reviews and was unsuccessfully nominated earlier this month.  The nomination failed due to a lack of copyediting, which I and others have been working on without rest. :)  Would any of you 'regulars' zip on over and take a look?  I'm asking on the Talk Page because I don't want to nominate an article twice within the same month unless it's got a really good chance of passing. Palm_Dogg 06:21, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  ''[[Starship Troopers]]'' 

message: I'd like to invite everyone to participate in the Wikipedia:Featured Music Project.  The Featured Music Project is an attempt to improve a large number of articles on musicians to make them ready to be a featured article.  To sign up, put your name under one (or more) of the eight categories on the status page, such as the discography, format and style or lead section.  No more than once a month, you'd be given an article which is getting close to being ready for WP:FAC, and is only deficient in a few categories.  You'd do what you can in the section you signed up for (and, of course, anything else you like).  If a couple of people specialize in each category, we should be able to take some concrete steps towards improvement on a wide range of articles.  In addition, you can sign up as a "shepherd" to take articles that meet all the criteria through a peer review and (hopefully) successful candidacy.  If you have any questions, feel free to leave me a note on my talk page, or on the FMP talk page. Tuf-Kat 06:23, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Featured Music Project 

message: Triumph of the Will has a gallery of fair use pictures. There was a notice at the bottom of the article before it was featured on the main page asking readers to view  and the article talk for a discussion of the various images' copyrights, which appeared to imply the article's images are PD -- a rather poor excuse for not just tagging them as such and uploading them to Commons, which is for galleries (Wikipedia is not for galleries of images). However, the article talk only stated:
:Now from what I gathered from discussing both with Riefenstahl and with producer at Synapse Films (they released Triumph of the Will on DVD in the early 2000's) copyright status can and has been avoided in various "versions" of the film (on DVD or VHS or in screening rights). These are versions that may have been held, like the one in the Library of Congress that Synapse utilized as 'public domain' or may have been edited slightly to avoid (is that the right word ?) infringement on Transit (or Riefenstahl for that matter). I have no idea how accurate these claims are but it may help explain why you have so many differing opinions on this matter of who, if anyone, holds the film rights.
The image talk page however, had the input of someone from the German Wikipedia, who stated:
:In deWP we tag PD only images older than 100 years. The reason is the fact that nearly all pictures are to be evaluated as photo work and so a protection of 70 years pma is given.
Template talk:PD-Germany, which was cited by the discussion as evidence that the image was PD, has a notice at the bottom stating that the template was TfDed due to terribly inappropriate wording, and this was only rectified by altering the template's text. Furthermore, :Image:1936NurembergRally.jpg is not even used in Triumph of the Will. From this, I believe we should assume the images are not PD, as there are very stringent laws pertaining to public domain images, especially in Germany. (There was a discussion on IRC earlier about whether the images are PD -- a British statute was cited, which stated that all German works imported into Britain between 1939 and 1951 were in the public domain, but the film was first released in Germany in 1935. Furthermore, as Wikipedia is hosted in the United States and the Wikimedia Foundation is based in Florida, I believe only United States law applies to it.)
Surprisingly, this troubling issue of fair use/weak claims of public domain, was not addressed by the FAC which passed this article. When it was first suggested for the main page, I brought this issue up. The article was nevertheless slated for the main page. Indignant, I complained in more detail on the TFA talk, and on the article talk. Now today, lo and behold, the article is on the main page, with my complaint having been totally ignored! Since apparently people think this can be just brushed aside nonchalantly because, y'know, them Nazis ain't ever gonna' sue nobody for using their pictures, I've made this excruciatingly detailed and long comment, and I will cross-post it to wherever I feel relevant. See also Wikipedia:Fair_use_review#Images. Yes, I know, some will scream m:Avoid copyright paranoia. However, we have insisted on removing fair use images from people's talk pages, even though there is a zero chance of being sued for their use (really, will the US Democratic Party sue us for using their logo in a userbox?), so why should we brush this off when an article supposed to be our best work and appearing on our gateway to the world so blatantly violates the provisions of fair use and/or the definition of a public domain image? Johnleemk | Talk 15:09, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Linkage between WP:TFA and WP:FAC/WP:FA doesn't seem to be too popular a concern... Or maybe it's just this subject? --Tsavage 18:37, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Our featured article of the day has legal problems 

message: Ahoy all!  There is currently a poll taking place on here about defining a set time period after an article's promotion to featured status for initiating a FARC.  Thanks!  --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 04:02, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh for the love of pete. There's no need for a poll. Keeping in mind that FARC is not FAC, just use your good judgement and remove rebound noms when they happen. Raul654 04:15, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

text: No, this is an awful idea. Raul654 04:13, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: One: This isn't about length of Farc nomination (that standard is two weeks).  Two: There does not need to be a set limit for FAC noms: by its very nature, putting a limit is pure Folly.  --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 04:16, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

text: Oh, but we will - the continuously positive ΔFA in Wikipedia:Featured article statistics shows that FAC has always outpaced FARC to date.  But the ΔFA seems to be have been stuck at 30±5 articles since April 2004: perhaps FAC is not scaling well? -- ALoan (Talk) 15:01, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think it is clear it is not scaling well. But hidden in that 30 number is the fact that articles that are clearly not going to make it do get removed quicker than they used to, as do some promotions. The FA rate is only declining slightly, from a high of .11% of articles to something like .09%. But the scaling issue is on the number of people willing and able to make accurate assessments of the nominations. Some nominations receive very little commentary now. I'm not sure there's a way to make it scale better--you can't force people to review articles more and more accurately or only nominate better articles. - Taxman Talk 15:37, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The net change is a bad indicator. The gross number of new FAs has risen steadily per month. However, the number of de-featured articles has increased, as older unreferenced articles are removed, thus obscuring the absolute increase. I predict that the expectations for what constitutes a featured articles are levelling off, and that the number of FARCs will ultimately decrease. Raul654 15:44, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with the levelling off prediction. This isn't the abyss we're approaching, just discussing how to get a little closer to the goal. The FA standards are high, the "average FA quality" isn't as. It'd be dismal if the two didn't keep approaching, but there is a practical limit to what an encylopedia article can/should ever be, and I don't see that as changing unless all of WP radically reshapes into something completely different. Requirements can't keep rising forever. At some point, FA process and quality should be just fine. --Tsavage 20:56, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Seeking Specificity in Policy over at [[Wikipedia:Featured article removal candidates]] 

message: I understand that an unusual number of FACs are taking longer to resolve problems and develop consensus, but why is the promotion of a few already-set-for-promotion cases held up? Also, a lot of those having problems need to go back to peer review - no need to keep them here. Rama's Arrow 20:26, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Raul noted above that he's currently busy IRL with "crushing assignments one-after-another" in one of his college courses.  I'm sure the uncontested noms will move on shortly. Slambo (Speak) 21:43, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for addressing concerns and resolving the issue! Rama's Arrow 15:42, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

text: My article got more useful, valid, constructive feedback after 10 MINUTES on the FAC list than it got in two WEEKS on the Peer Review area...and that's despite me posting a request to Peer Review onto the talk pages of around a dozen related articles!  If that's typical then realistically, sending a failed FAC back for Peer review is kinda pointless. If the editors couldn't/wouldn't/didn't fix the problems addressed by FAC comments, why would peer review help? SteveBaker 00:30, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: FAC isn't for heavy duty jobs though - it's for polishing a mostly-finished article, not tearing it down and rebuilding it. Raul654 00:32, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Promotions heldup 

message: there is  1 object on the Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/The Illuminatus! Trilogy page. 
one by andrew levine has been addressed, but he now doesnt respond to the comment on the FAC page, or comments on his talk page, to see if all is good. 
one by jkelly - i requested clarification about the nature of the issue from jkelly, again on the FAC page and on his talk page, but zero response. i understand a single unstriked object will make a candidacy fail, so what to do in these situations where objectors dont respond?
:A single objection need not sink an article. If it is fixable, fix it. If not cite your reasons clearly. If the objector fails to review your response after a set period of time, then the FA Director may consider the objection to be stale and ignore it. =Nichalp «Talk»= 14:22, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: lack of response from objectors