Talk: Featured Article Nomination

Opposition Votes

So, with the new "introduction" of opposing votes... how does this affect the maximum monthly vote? Is it still one per month? Maybe one support and one oppose per month? One support and no maximum opposition? Thoughts? --Ando (Talk) 20:10, 29 February 2008 (EST)

Same as with supporting votes, it's a maximum of one opposition per article/picture, and you cannot oppose content which you nominated yourself. And just like support, opposition can be retracted at the user's discretion.

Given these constraints, a monthly limit on opposition would seem unfair; support is about picking which article/picture you like best, but opposition isn't about picking your least favourite. It's intended to allow users to voice their concerns over content which, in their view, doesn't meet the required standards. At any given time, that may be none of the nominated article, or all of them. So I'd say there needs to be free reign to voice opposition. However, the requirements for a valid opposition are more specific; statements which equate to "I don't like ___." are not sufficient and will be discounted unless the users substantiates them. —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 02:47, 1 March 2008 (EST)

Alright, I figured as much; that was what I was hoping for. --Ando (Talk) 13:30, 1 March 2008 (EST)

Could someone put the exact opposition vote rules on the project page? Just so all voters understand the process.--Matt 14:39, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Done as requested :) Adam 18:11, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Featured Article, or Featured Boss?

Bear in mind that already, four of our Featured Articles are bosses (Dark Link, Zant, Ganon, Dodongo). Now look at the current nominees (Majora's Mask, Gohma, Helmaroc King, Darknut, Volvagia); more bosses. Yes, they're cool, but are they great articles? Some don't even meet the minimum requirements... Couple the boss-heavy focus with the enemies nominated/featured (Stalfos, Moblin, ReDead, Octorok) and bingo, 60% are bosses or enemies. What about places, people, items, events etc. ? —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 17:02, 7 March 2008 (EST)

"Yes, they're cool"

That, sir, is exactly why all those articles are there. Of the seven currently nominated articles, only one nominator actually gave a reason for the article to be featured that wasn't "its a cool boss so it should be featured". People don't really seem to get what makes a featured article. It's a shame, really (and only made worse by half of the voters only echoing "yep, cool boss"). What can we really do about this, though (you'd think that listing the criteria for a featured article at the top of the page would be enough, but...)? --Ando (Talk) 21:21, 9 March 2008 (EDT)

Glad I'm not alone! If you're with me on any of those which I opposed, then adding your name to mine will help clear out some of the poorer articles (then we'd just need one more like-minded person!) —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 15:19, 10 March 2008 (EDT)

How about instead of clearing out the unpopular articles we give them a chance to shine by putting it on the Featured Article Nomination page? If a small article (in need of work or detailing) is put on the project page perhaps more people will work on it. It's just a thought but I think it might work. ZeldaGirl96 00:24, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not really sure what you mean? Putting poor articles up for nomination? As for people working on something, well, we have the Articles in need of attention category where anyone can see any articles that need some serious working. —Ando (talk) 02:49, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I didn't realize we had a page like that! (you guys already thought about everything!) Thanks for getting back to me Ando. ZeldaGirl96 01:06, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Featured Article Nomination Template

Could someone make a template to place in articles that have been nominated to become a featured article? I think this is a little too important to make myself. I have not been here that long.--Matt 01:21, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Hm, and interesting idea. So a sort of "Hey, this article has been nominated to be a featured article! GO VOTE ON IT OR SOMETHING" sort of deal? I could see this working. In fact, I like the idea. Anyone disapprove? --Ando (T) 16:02, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. --Guy ^(T|C) 22:45, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

I see that it is done. Looks great.--Matt 13:17, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Opposing Approved Articles

The Zelda series is ongoing, and articles need to be updated and changed as their subject matter evolves and more information becomes available, but new edits might hurt the article as much as they help it. New standards of the wiki make once feature-worthy articles obsolete as well, so I suggest there be a way to "de-feature" featured articles, if only until they're improved. Some featured articles lack decent organization in some areas and proper cities in others... Though there aren't any strong examples for it now, there should also be a way to get a failed nomination nominated again; it's more likely that an article will be improved than become worse or stay at its current level for an eternity.

I assumed this would be added with oppositions, but I couldn't find it specifically mentioned anywhere. Sorry if I just didn't look hard enough. --Guy ^(T|C) 22:45, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

As for point number 2 (re-nominating a previously failed article or picture), it states on the Failed Nominations page, I believe, that "three signed votes in opposition of a nomination temporarily bar it from being featured" (paraphrasing).

Point 1... is a good one. I've thought about this before. Maybe we should set some kind of "Featured Article review team" to look over all of the featured articles and see if they're still up to snuff. Maybe? --Ando (T) 02:27, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Categorizing Feature-Related Pages

There's a category for featured content, but with the new addition of many pages dedicated to the voting of featured content, maybe there should be a category just for those types of pages. It would make it easier for people (like me) who want to look for a certain one of these pages but are either too lazy to type out the full name or don't know the full name, and it just seems like it could be convenient to have a list of them all (including the Featured Content category, of course). --Guy ^(T|C) 22:45, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Hey, another good idea. I'll get on it right away. --Ando (T) 02:27, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Reminder

I have just made reminder templates. They are used to remind users that they have already voted. See Template: Article Reminder and Template: Picture Reminder. Also look on my talk page to see how they are to be placed on user talk pages.--Matt 20:10, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

So...

10 votes for the Master Sword...so how long is it going to be before it's featured? I notice that it's been here for at least two days, even with 10 votes. --Mr. Mystery, 24 June 2008 (EST)

The current method we have for displaying featured articles is simplistic and limits the number we may have. This requires another article to be disqualified. A much better script to display featured articles has already been written. The script would let us have a maximum of 182 featured articles providing they are changed every two days. The script has yet to be implemented.Matt ^(Talk) 04:37, June 24, 2008 (UTC)

Right, I typically let Adam handle this (he's better at it than I am) and the staff hasn't actually discussed your idea in detail, Matt... Alright, Matt, if you notice that we're both on at the same time, drop me a line. I'm thinking about implementing your idea (I don't think that the staff seemed too against it). —Ando (talk) 12:29, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Right now we have 31 templates for featured articles. Since each article gets two templates, we should put this new featured article on template 31 and make another one numbered 32. I'll do the updating to the script once that is done.Matt ^(Talk) 15:50, June 24, 2008 (UTC)

Removed opposition vote for The Golden Goddesses

FRIGGIN' HITTING THE ENTER BUTTON WHILE TRYING TO EDIT THE SUMMARY AND IT SAVES THE PAGE BEFORE YOU CAN FINISH ARGGHSDFODIOSMLKNH
Anyway, so, Felicia's Champion: I re-added your opposition vote to The Golden Goddesses, but with a note stating that the problem is resolved and that you'd withdrawn your vote (with proof so I'm not accused of poll-altering later on). I believe it to be more "historically accurate" this way, that way we know exactly how the votes went down (plus, a year from now, Sea's "It's got a picture of Nayru now" might seem a little random without knowing the story behind it, don't you think?).
I figure that any moved votes for featured content should follow this. —Ando (talk) 01:57, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Alright, I see. Yep, that makes sense. --Felicia's Champion 02:08, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Well it does. Apparantly Ando was thinking the same thing while editing as I was looking for the picture "WHERE IS THIS F****** PICTURE THERE A GOD D*** FARORE AND DIN ALL OVER THE PLACE WHY CAN'T THERE BE A NAYRU D*****!"

Excuse the language, but it gets old when you can't find the Nayru picture. —Seablue 12:04, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

OK, I can understand the F-word being censored, but why "Damn"? You even used "Friggin', Ando which seems to be a lot worse than plain old "Damn". —Seablue 15:27, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Making a nomination

how do i make a nomination?Dragonstetraforce 22:36, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

It's quite simple, really. Simply copy this text:

== [[article]] ==

description

{{Support}}

{{Oppose}}

{{clear}}

Just replace "article" with the name of the article you want to nominate, replace "description" with the reason that you're nominating it, and leave everything else untouched. Put all that underneath all of the current nominees and you've just nominated an article! ;) —Ando (talk) 01:44, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

thanksDragonstetraforce 23:04, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

so um... how long does it take for people to vote?Dragonstetraforce 21:34, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Basically however long it takes for them to decide to check the nomination pages and see what they want to vote for. Heck, there hasn't actually been a vote in almost half a month; remember, these are regular people just like you, most of whom probably don't come to the wiki daily; sometimes maybe not even weekly. As such, it could take a while for votes to start showing up, but as the month passes you should start to see something happen. ;) —Ando (talk) 00:55, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

ok, ill keep that in mind.Dragonstetraforce 00:28, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

hold on isnt the idea to pick the most well written article. tetraforce has some great detail.Dragonstetraforce 20:24, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Bring it up with the opposers.

Besides, it's NOT a real thing in the Zelda Universe. It's a fan-made rumour. And as such, I believe this should not be nominated. I'll oppose it later. --Felicia's Champion 23:36, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Number of Votes

i accept the fact the article lost. but something in the procecss just isnt fair. it takes 10 votes for it to be approved but only 3 to be rejected. this makes articles rejcted too quickly and there is just no time to collect 10. as a result the current article stays much longer and many articles are rejected without a fair chance. how about 5 support and 5 oppose?Dragonstetraforce 20:39, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

same goes for pictures.Dragonstetraforce 00:14, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Interesting point. We may have to change it. But perhaps we should take small steps first. We could change the opposition vote requirement to five instead of three. We can keep the support votes where there are. We can try this out for a few months and if it works we could consider other possibilities.Matt ^(Talk) 00:22, September 20, 2008 (UTC)

Um, typically if an article gains three opposition votes that quickly then it's clearly not cut out to be featured (at least, not in the eyes of the community, who it's being featured FOR). I honestly don't see any reason to bump it up, and would prefer if it stay down - there have been many times where two opposition votes will be given and there REALLY needs to be a third, yet none is made, so an "okay" article becomes featured. But if more people want this, I guess we'll have to change it. —Ando (talk) 04:21, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm with Ando on this. The balance is skewed to give much greater weight to opposition votes for a reason. Opposition voting was originally added as a safeguard to prevent content deemed unsuitable from being featured, since the goal of Featured content is to represent the very best we have to offer. If three individuals find fault enough with a particular article or image to take the time to vote against it, then it's clearly not the best. Would we really want to see Featured articles that got 10 support votes along with four strong oppositions? I feel uneasy seeing something featured with more than one reasoned opposing comment. I could easily see this resulting in more people voting against stuff just to get the numbers up. Also, of the 11 articles we've featured so far this year, they had only two opposition votes between them all. Really, my only concern with opposition voting is that sometimes the "regulars" here are too quick to throw in oppositions votes, and this can then colour other voters' opinions. If people would be willing to follow my personal unwritten rule to refrain from adding an opposing vote less than a week after something was nominated, it may redress the balance somewhat? —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 06:21, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

i think pepole who vote oppose have much less of a reson. just check the failed nominations.Dragonstetraforce 16:15, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

plus the number of support voters could higher than the number of support votes taken when you get 3 oppose becuse like YOU said ando, most users arent regulars. you cant take it back now becuse i just quoted you. Dragonstetraforce 23:15, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

...what? --Felicia's Champion 23:59, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

My sentiments exactly, FC. Any chance you could, uh, re-phrase what you said there, Dragon? You made it sound like I disproved my own argument with that quote of yours, but I don't honestly see how that affects anything. —Ando (talk) 03:08, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

I'll try at translation. Most users of Zelda Wiki.org are not regular users. Failed nominations are voted down by the regular members for the most part. Hence the problem. By only requiring three opposition votes, we are effectively silencing the voice of a vast majority of our users. True, us regulars take a lot of the workload and responsibility. But we are not the only ones here and we'd be nothing without the other members. In the interest of being fair, or at least more so, to all our members, we should consider raising the opposition vote requirement.Matt ^(Talk) 03:28, September 23, 2008 (UTC)

Oh...why couldn't he just say that?

The most I would consider raising the opposition votes to is 5. No more than that, and I'm happy with it to stay at three. --Felicia's Champion 11:14, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps that IS what he meant. I dunno. D:

I'd never consider raising the minimum of opposition votes. Like I said before, if something hits three opposition votes that quickly, it's clearly not worthy of being featured. Increasing that to five would, I believe, only increase the amount of garbage that gets through because FOUR people think no, but there's just not a fifth. Do we really want something to be featured that makes it only by a slight majority - something that's just "okay"? No - featured content is supposed to be the best of the best. After all, did anyone even notice what Adam said?: "of the 11 articles we've featured so far this year, they had only two opposition votes between them all." I think that goes to show just the kind of uniform agreement we should want in choosing our featured content.

Regarding the whole "regulars vs. non-regulars" thing, it's typically our regulars who know what makes good featured material anyway. I'm not saying that their vote has more weight, merely that they're more apt to vote "no" on a poor-quality thing because they've had time to see what should and shouldn't get featured, and their ability to determine if something is worthy of that status is greater than that of New User who just registered yesterday and is still learning how to work this thing.

I will agree that quite often people who oppose a nomination often have poor reasoning ("everyone knows about this already", or "we shouldn't give just this content in this set the special treatment of being featured" is the lamest thing I've ever heard), but support votes are really no different. Take, for instance, these, which I've pulled straight from the featured article archive: "He needs more fans." "Fun game i like it!" "The master sword is EPIC." Surely these aren't proper reasons to vote for something? They don't mention the article at all, only its subject. Just thought I'd bring that point up. —Ando (talk) 18:05, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Also, I'm a little offended that you honestly think I'd try to "take back" something I said. :( I'm a little more scrupulous than that. :P

What someone should do, before tearing 'failed' articles off of the featured page, is read the opposition votes. I'm sure people like the sysops do, but I've noticed on occasion that some articles are dismissed for reasons not relating to the article. Case in point: the Redead article (I'll agree it would have eventually failed, but still...) was disqualified with one of the votes against it saying: I like the article, but I have to oppose because I HATE these enemies! Their screams freak me out completely!

Votes like this should not be counted towards the opposition. opinions? --Felicia's Champion 06:58, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Excellent idea, but SOME kind of true system would have to be devised, because before long you know we'd be getting someone saying "what are you talking about that was a great vote!!!!!!!" Unless it's left entirely up to the sysops (whose opinions I'm sure are completely trusted ;P) or something? I love the theory, but I'm not sure that it would completely work... though, who's to say that it would hurt to try it out for a couple of nominations? —Ando (talk) 15:35, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

how about this, we can have a third section labeld challenge. this section lets people challenge other votes and someone shall decide.Dragonstetraforce 23:34, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

just in case there is a major disagreement.Dragonstetraforce 20:37, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

No need. The rules are very clearly stated at the top of the page. That opposition vote was in violation of the rules. It is that simple. There is no point debating what was already determined to be against the rules.Matt ^(Talk) 04:41, September 27, 2008 (UTC)

That's a good point. "These should be reasoned votes based on the criteria above." The question is, how do we go about saying "Hey, your vote is completely subjective / not related to the article at all, it's no good", and how to discount it? Perhaps a new addition like the {{unsign}} template that adds a (Vote is subjective - see rule 3) or some similarly worded thing? —Ando (talk) 15:56, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

ok, i think i got it. how about: "any vote based mainly on populairity and not on status of the article will not be counted for oppose" and we could replace article with picture when needed.Dragonstetraforce 16:05, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

also i still think 5-5 is the best choice. but hey if it works, ill take it:)

I agree with Andy. That's all I have to say :P --Felicia's Champion 22:42, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

also im a bit worryed the other wikis are ahead of us. bulba has a comment system so admins can add their opinions about certin votes. if WE had that too we wouldnt be talking about it here.Dragonstetraforce 19:03, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Possible New Voting Policy Two -- VOTING CLOSED

Please note, voting on this issue has now closed, with the proposal being rejected. Opinions may still be expressed below
(Admin's note: I'm giving this two more days [until OCTOBER 28, 2008], at which point the polls will close and the highest-choice option wins) —Ando (talk) 14:40, 26 October 2008 (UTC) There is another policy that has been discussed. Some members has expressed concern that with the current number of required opposition votes removes the voice of a majority of members.

With this new policy the number of required opposition votes for a nomination to fail will be raised to FIVE VOTES.

Notes:

• Keep this clean and concise. Think carefully, then place your vote under the appropriate heading, and be sure to sign your vote with "~~~~".

• Make sure to check out the comments and the previous votes before voting yourself so you can make the best decision possible.

Support

1. I support this policy. When this policy was proposed, the admins rejected it out of hand without considering what the community wanted. I'm not stupid. I know that the other policy, however good it is, will fail. This will reduce the effect of members abusing the same-reason loophole. It will also keep nominations up long enough for many more people to get their say. Most of our members are not regulars. Our regulars are way too fast to vote out new nominations. We need this.Matt ^(Talk) 15:08, October 7, 2008 (UTC)
2. yes. i NEED this system. thats a lot of perfectly great articles AND pictures in the trash. im not willing to lose this fight. Dragonstetraforce 21:18, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
3. I support this one, I think three votes just isn't enough. From what I've seen just as many people oppose to content as they do to support it, yet it takes 10 supports to let it pass? I agree it's worse for a 'bad' picture to be approved than a 'good' one to be disqualified, but that's why I think 5 votes for an opposition is a good direction, 3 against 10 just doesn't seem very fair at all. — Steve 20:35, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Opposition

1. Also against this idea. Featured content is supposed to be the best of the best. If something reaches three opposition votes, regardless of if it's from regulars or not, then clearly it must be mediocre content — something not worthy of being featured. Raising the opposition vote limit increases the chance of this average (or worse) content making it through the system and becoming featured. After all, our regulars don't oppose so quickly for the sake of opposing content - they do it because they know what should and shouldn't pass. —Ando (talk) 17:15, 7 October 2008 (UTC)
2. I don't see anything better Matt, I mean if you walk on water or something ya might convince me lol!! I'm going to say that Ando conveyed my thoughts completely. Opps! I shouldn't have said that because my vote might not count now, right? I have to wonder WHY people always insist on voting for something that is NOT going to better us? I mean this is just another "loophole" for users to get mediocre material into the wiki! How in the world could that better us? I'm against this, hands down.Mandi ^Talk 13:11, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
3. I'm sorry Matt, but in my opinion your comment below is incorrect. Most (popular) articles gain enough support to be featured in 4-6 weeks max. And as we all know, just because an article's subject matter is popular, it certainly doesn't always follow that the quality of the content merits being featured. Also, looking at the historical Failed Nominations, it's quite clear that the majority of opposition votes are cast by our small groups of most regular contributors. By increasing the number of opposition votes required, we would be binding ourselves into a situation whereby we're reliant on enough of these members to (a) have a strong opinion against a nomination, and (b) have enough time to add their opposition vote before it's too late. It may sound overly dramatic, but that's the kind of scenario this change would leave us open to. Given that the "opposers" in question are such a small group of regulars, I'd suggest that the solution should be a more informal one; we recognise that an opposition votes is three times as powerful as a supporting one, and use it wisely. In that way, it's more like a veto, and as such should be used with discretion. I would advocate always leaving 7-10 days before opposing, and of course ensuring that the opposition is made on strong content- or style-base grounds rather than personal opinion. —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 05:42, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
4. I wasn't sure what to vote for, but I'm choosing to vote against this policy. Featured pictures need to be the best of the best. Somtimes good pictures will be disqualified but if this policy passes then okay pictures might end up being featured, and as I said above, featured pictures need to be the best of the best.--Link hero of light 01:42, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

OTHER COMMENTS:

• I'd just like to point out that this policy will no way let mediocre or low-quality material through. It just is not possible for only two more votes to do that. If something is not good enough, then there is nothing stopping its failure. So don't be so quick to vote against this like Ando was. Think it through first. Actually consider it and you'll see that it is for the better.Matt ^(Talk) 20:15, October 7, 2008 (UTC)
• im just wondering, how are we to vote on how we vote? do we vote on a new policy useing the policy?Dragonstetraforce 20:55, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Not really. I'm just letting it go for another week or so, and whatever's got the highest amount of votes wins. —Ando (talk) 21:05, 15 October 2008 (UTC)
• I mentioned adding a suggestion to the nomination pages based on something Adam said a while back. The suggestion would state that it would be preferred if you'd give a week or so before opposing a vote. Perhaps we could make it a straight-and-fast rule? —Ando (talk) 14:56, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

• Yeah, that could fly. It might not be a bad idea, give it a go.Mandi ^Talk 19:51, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

P.s. I apologize for the "Walk on water" comment I made in my last post. It wasn't ment for anyone, It just sounded really smart @#s. So, sorry about thatThe Sage of Cosmos 19:44, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

• Ehh... I don't think that work out. What if something that really sucks gets nominated? You know, something that is a total piece of crap. It'll be stuck up there for a week, wasting space.Matt ^(Talk) 20:10, October 16, 2008 (UTC)
  • And how is that any worse than said "piece of crap" being stuck up there waiting for the extra two opposition votes (which you're supporting)? —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 21:26, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
    • If something is a "piece of crap", two more votes will slow it down very little. But a one-week time limit will. There are more than three regulars you know. Well more than five. If something sucks, we'll vote it out. There are enough regulars that show up about every day or two to vote out anything that is bad. But with something more subjective, they'll be more hesitant. Simple. If I wanted to hold off failings I'd go for ten opposition votes.Matt ^(Talk) 21:40, October 16, 2008 (UTC)

• I don't think that this is a bad idea. At least this will enable some users to look over a nomination and "consider" if or if not it is a "piece of crap" I think this is more or less a happy medium, between what Matt, and several others wanted to do. Mandi ^Talk 22:26, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

• • • • "If something sucks, we'll vote it out."
        Exactly! That's why the "quick to act regulars" are so quick to act - because THEY have more experience with what should and shouldn't pass, and will take the measures necessary to make sure it doesn't pass. So if we're going to vote it out anyway, what's the point in extending the vote amount to give those one or two people who say it's good time to give their support votes right before the last person places the fifth opposition vote? The support votes were in vain because it was gonna fail anyway, and they might have been able to save said votes if the item could be voted out more quickly. And if we get, say, four opposition votes and ten support votes, it passes -- but why? It's clearly a mediocre item if four people had faults with it, and isn't the kind of thing we want featured. —Ando (talk) 22:38, 16 October 2008 (UTC)
        P.S. If anything in here didn't make sense, it's 'cause I'm still on chemo drugs and I'm really, really dizzy and my thought processes are at about zero. D:

• The two new votes are intended for content that doesn't have a clear and obvious problem with it. Both the new votes and the waiting period would help out this type of content. The waiting period has a huge negative effect on sucky material. The new votes would delay failure of this stuff a lot less longer than the waiting period. Therefore the new votes policy is the "lesser of two evils".Matt ^(Talk) 22:49, October 16, 2008 (UTC)
  Heh, heh. Well, lack of sleep, or a glaring headache, will do the same thing to the mind. It sucks.

• • The "lesser of two evils"?? If this policy is "evil"... why implement it? Also, I'd like to ask you something: When have you EVER seen anything truly worth becoming featured (meaning it met all the criteria, and non-criteria-based oppositions aside since we didn't decide to start making ridiculous "no because i wet my pants" votes not count at until now) get the three opposition votes? Was ANYTHING on this page failed even though it didn't deserve it? (take into account the time differences between then and the edits made since) No. Everything there was failed, quickly or not, by regulars or not, because it was poor quality. At the same time, has anything (post mid-2007, since that's really when the standards rose) that HAS been featured gotten it undeservingly? No. If the system isn't broken, why fix it? —Ando (talk) 04:24, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

• • • It is a figure of speech. It means that they both have problems, but one of them is not as bad. That saying is ancient. You have heard its meaning?Matt ^(Talk) 04:28, October 17, 2008 (UTC)
• Darknut, Master Sword, Zora, Gohma, Master Sword. :P There have been a few. Plus that one Death Sword image. It is a "better safe than sorry" kind of thing.Matt ^(Talk) 04:40, October 17, 2008 (UTC)
  • Zora? Ehh... Ahhh crap! Oops. Heh, heh. I guess I have a project page for next few days.Matt ^(Talk) 05:00, October 17, 2008 (UTC)

• Yeah, I know the phrase - I just always took it to mean "both of these are bad, but this is just the less-bad". Meaning if you can avoid having to choose either of them at all, do so, 'cause why would you want to choose a bad option?
  Wait, you think that Darknut, in the state it was in when it was nominated, was worthy of passing?? Ditto for Gohma. You can't say anything about Zora, for reasons it appears you've already figured out. :P Also, you withdrew the Master Sword image yourself, so I'm not sure what you mean there.
  But can you honestly tell me that you think that those were acceptable at the time they were nominated? —Ando (talk) 05:29, 17 October 2008 (UTC)
  Also, project page? what

Acceptable no. but the Darknut one was failed for problems that were easily fixed. On the policies ,the addressed problems are relatively minor. It is very hard to have a new policy that has no problems with it. It is unrealistic to expect that. So we have to work with what we can do. These two policies would help out a lot. But we only need one and the negative side-effects are worse in one.Matt ^(Talk) 05:48, October 17, 2008 (UTC)

• 3 questions

1.can we shut up and vote?

2.is anyone going to answer my above question?

3.can everyone stop switching sides and giveing me a headache?

thank you.Dragonstetraforce 20:55, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

• Wh... what?? One: anyone discussing this already HAS voted. Two: I already answered your question if you're referring to the "do we vote using the policy" question. I said "not really" right below that. Meaning "no, and because of that, this is how we're gonna do it:". Three: I don't recall anyone switching sides, actually. —Ando (talk) 20:58, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

---

This was not done correctly. We should have put a notice on the main page for something so important. Once again, I cannot fully express how wrong all the votes against this were. That is not an opinion. It is a fact. Those alleged downsides do not exist. At least not to the extreme that was claimed. Seven votes is hardly the whole community. This is not a final decision. I intend to reopen voting on this issue in a month or two. I will cite my favorite saying: "Even if 300,000,000 people make the same mistake, it is still a mistake." It means that even if the majority wins at something, they can still be flat-out wrong. Look a Wikipedia: It is so screwed up and corrupted. All because something was popular and the lesser users just "followed the leaders." Mistakes of leader filter down to the subordinates. Well, guys, whether I'm an admin or not, I'm still a leader here too. I've submitted to other's opinions before. I've gotten better at logical reasoning. This policy is a good one. And I fail to see why you guys are holding on to false beliefs. Then again, so does most of the world. But I thought the we were better than that? You guys have to swallow your pride and give up on your false idea of this policy. Don't say I haven't given in to you guy before. I have! I had the guts to admin I was wrong at something. Time to return the favor. I challenge thee!Matt ^(Talk) 21:54, November 4, 2008 (UTC)

If you guys think that I like arguing with you, think again. I hate it. But sacrifices must be made in the pursuit of truth. It is the perfectionist in me. How else would I be so obsessed with fixing redirects?Matt ^(Talk) 23:15, November 4, 2008 (UTC)

Golden Goddesses?

Why isn't it featured yet? It's had 10 votes for about two months...does nobody want to do the task of making it featured? Or does nobody like it enough to perform the task? Or is it something else? --Felicia's Champion 03:57, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Oh.

Uh.

Hm.

I'll get on that right away. :P —Ando (talk) 04:20, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Wait.....

Heh, heh... Well... Oops. Okay, before we finalize its featured status, there is an article eligible for disqualification. It is Boomerang. So are we still using that page to disqualify articles? We need to decide that first.Matt ^(Talk) 04:22, October 15, 2008 (UTC)

I was one step ahead of you, man. :D —Ando (talk) 04:32, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Acceptable Votes

I just have something to say, I'm not meaning to detract from the matter at hand here, so don't take it that way. I noticed alot of support votes have NOTHING to do with why the voters are choosing to support the image, more or less they have to do with the fact that "I love the Master Sword!" "Midna is cool" that sort of thing, I think maybe we should put a ban on votes that support the image, because they liked WHAT the image is of, not support it because they liked the PICTURE for clarity, ect. I see numerous images that have like 8 support votes, but half of them supporters because said examples above. If somebody doesn't think this was a good idea, or if I wasn't making any sense, please tell me. The Sage of Cosmos 14:33, 17 October 2008 (UTC)(talk)

Aye, we actually discussed this a little bit earlier, and the consensus was that it's a good idea. We just need to figure out how exactly to do it. Perhaps that can be our next step after this is done. —Ando (talk) 14:54, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

This was of the topic of the section so I made a new section to discuss it. So, it sounds good. It won't be easy. It seems that this very subject is brought up on every page where featured content voting is an issue. The consensus seems to be in favor of it. This should definitely go both ways. Whether or not you like the subject, that should has no effect on your judgment of the material. A great example of a recent nomination that went exactly like we want it to was the Adventure of Link Sword. The people that voted put aside their feelings about the game and voted solely on the quality of the image. There are some details we'd have to iron out. Like how we will enforce this. Things like that.Matt ^(Talk) 17:16, October 17, 2008 (UTC)

• Yeah, that sword looked awesome ;) But, uh...the voting will probally be an issue. I hadn't thought about it but, enforcing might be harder then I was thinking....hm..The Sage of Cosmos 22:52, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

So should it be an extra section within the nomination that would allow you to contest votes (so you'd get something like {{Support}} {{Oppose}} {{contest}})? This is what I'm thinking:

Support

Oppose

Contest

Where contest would be a section where one person could say "I believe that support / opposition vote number X is invalid due to subjectiveness", and if, say, two other people agree (creating a consensus of three), the vote is rendered null. Should we implement this? —Ando (talk) 02:05, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Sound good. This policy would be supported by just about everyone that voted on the other one anyway, so we might just implement it. Perhaps we could use this image for it?Matt ^(Talk) 04:44, October 21, 2008 (UTC)

Okey, I see Ando is saying, have a third opening (contest) I hadn't thought about it like that.....sounds better then what I was thinking. That would be more fair. Sounds good..Go team ;) -The Sage of Cosmos 23:05, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Yeah that came from a suggestion I made to him in an email. That would definitely be the best course. Once there there is a consensus of three, we can mark the vote as invalid using a template like the unsign one. But there is one thing, once this is made a rule, we can should only be able to contest vote made after the rule is put into effect. It is only fair. No point in punishing people for a breaking a rule before it actually is a rule. That should be the most important parts.Matt ^(Talk) 23:24, October 21, 2008 (UTC)

Good point about negating the ability to contest previous votes. Fortunately that won't have to be an issue before too long. I'll work on fine-tuning the details, then getting the new template made and modifying the FA Nomination page header to include this new feature. —Ando (talk) 00:22, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm in two minds about this. One one hand, some votes are clearly not valid; some previous examples include "I'm all for this", "ALMOST THERE!", and "Yep!" ...

However, how do we distinguish between an invalid vote, and one that's simply brief or concise? The article votes are more straightforward, since there are clear cut criteria by which they should be judged. Votes based solely on the subject matter and not the article content, style or layout are invalid. Images, on the other hand, are a different matter. Their "worthiness" can legitimately be entirely subjective, therefore a vote stating "This is an interesting image, I like it" fits all of the criteria given on the voting page, and would (in my view) be valid. I just can't see how such a policy of Contesting votes could work with pictures without the voting rules being tightened, and I can't see any way that could easily be achieved.

This also raises a secondary concern for me; it seems to me that we're rapidly running out of suitable content to be featured, and as a result the number of votes being cast has dropped off notably. Do we really want to be further reducing the number of votes cast? —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 22:47, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

You brought up a good point Adam. What I was thinkig about were the votes that were like "Midna is cool" so the votes that really didn't address the photo, A vote stating "Cool image I like it" was not what I was talking about. But.......Um....I don't think I'm making any sense.The Sage of Cosmos 18:55, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

@Adam. That is exactly why we won't just flat-out declare a vote to be invalid. Three people have to agree to it. As we have have seen from my... uhh... lapse in judgment, just declaring a vote to be invalid, whether or not it is, just causes chaos. It was because of that that Ando and I thought it best to have a consensus of three to invalidate a vote. If a vote isn't really invalid by the rules, then just say so in the appropriate section.

There are about a dozen or so articles at least that can easily be feature-worthy, if we just put a little effort into improving them. A few examples are: Zora, Goron, Twinrova, Sacred Realm. Okay, the Sacred Realm one is really pathetic at the moment, but it has large potential if people would just work on it. I don't see us running out of images to feature. There are at least two others I know of right now. There are most likely a lot more sitting around and more to be uploaded later for sure.Matt ^(Talk) 19:26, October 23, 2008 (UTC)

Pathetic? Kinda harsh there...I'd say Sub-Average...

As for this new system, I'd very much like to contest/negate those votes which say nothing other than "yep!" or "Midna is HOT!".

That's all, folks! --Felicia's Champion 04:43, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

I basically wrote over half of that page. I consider myself fully entitled to call it pathetic. :P Matt ^(Talk) 04:49, October 24, 2008 (UTC)

Well, in that case... ;) --Felicia's Champion 00:35, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Dividing Line

This might seem obvious, but what is the dividing line between one month's votes and the next? For example, if it is 9:00PM November 30th at UTC-06 and a user votes, does it count as November's vote or December's? In the given example, it would be 2:00 AM December 1st (UTC) when the vote was cast. As far as I know, we don't have a policy on this.Matt ^(Talk) 04:08, November 7, 2008 (UTC)

That's a good question... We've never actually had a problem with this before, so I guess no one ever thought of it. Hm... I'd say that it would be best to go with what the timestamp in their signature displays (so, UTC). Technically, anyone that's -UTC shouldn't have a problem, and I don't think we have many +UTC'ers here (outside of a couple of you Aussie fellows). —Ando (talk) 04:36, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Might as well make it a policy to avoid debate if it does happen.Matt ^(Talk) 04:40, November 7, 2008 (UTC)

Voting

If I'm correct, I'm allowed to nominate one article per month AND vote my support on one article per month?—Justin^(Talk) 06:10, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

That you are. :) —Alter  ^{{T C B H }} 08:10, December 25, 2009 (UTC)

As long as the nomination and the supporting vote aren't on the same article. - M E L C H I Z E D E K  (TALK) 10:49, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Hahaha of course, silly! :P—Justin^(Talk) 16:19, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Proportion of articles featured

Roughly what proportion of ZW's content do we want to class as "featured"? I asked myself this, and wondered what the ratio was elsewhere. Wikipeida, for example, currently states that "about one in 1,120 articles [is featured]" (source). Our current ratio is considerably higher, with one Featured article in every 320 (so approximately the top 0.3%). Given that our article count is unlikely to climb significantly higher (I'd be surprised if we ever passed 4000), how much longer can we continue to add new Featured articles? I've already been feeling like we were "scraping the barrel" for a while; over the previous 19 months we've added only four new featured articles, and there's just one currently nominated. Perhaps it's time to review the system, and consider revisiting the disqualification process for cases where we do want to make space for a new article? —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 08:15, 7 December 2010 (EST)

There are a number of problems with that. First off, comparing us to Wikipedia is not really right for this. They're huge, and proportionally don't even have the kind of editing force we do compared to the total membership and article amount. Almost all the regular users on there are specialized ones. They only ever do one category of tasks. Like some only check image sourcing, some only fight vandalism, some only fix broken links, etc. Admins basically have to stop normal article editing when they get promoted because their powers are in extremely high demand. Their actual team of people that write articles is very, very small compared to their total amount of active users. And even those are specialized, only improving articles in a certain subject. So they really can't have a high ratio of featured articles like we do. Comparing us to them here is not right, we do not have all the same challenges to overcome as they do. Second, we should never disqualify anything just for the sake of disqualifying something. It's rather pointless and doesn't accomplish anything. There really is no limit to how many we can have. It's really against the spirit of the whole place to say that only a certain amount of articles can ever be considered to be good at all. In fact I don't even see how it hurts for it to be slow. The fact that there are few articles up can be a motivating force to improve other articles up to the point where they can be put up. If we just start disqualifying things it'll take away the value of the work put into them. Who's going to spend the time to get something up to featured status if some other people are going to simply disqualify it a few months later? A "let's make space for the sake of space" system has too many flaws to really work effectively.Matt ^(Talk) 18:23, December 7, 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I see Adam's point here. He thinks we're "running out" of articles that are feature worthy and that our featured content to normal content ratio will be too high. If this is such a concern, the only thing I can see would be to completely abolish the system altogether and do away with featured voting on articles for the time being. I really do not think that's necessary, nor do I really even think there's a problem. Yeah, there's definitely articles that were featured that don't actually deserve to be featured, or were but have now lost their luster, so we could do something about those. But, in all seriousness...

"Given that our article count is unlikely to climb significantly higher (I'd be surprised if we ever passed 4000),"

Considering our article count rises with each new game release due to their being different places, villains, characters, and such... I can definitely see our article count getting significantly higher. It's not like the Zelda Series is going to die any time soon.Mandi ^Talk 20:35, December 7, 2010 (UTC)

Matt, you seem to have spent a lot of time arguing against the validity of my comparison, but didn't actually address the issue I raised.

The process hasn't so much slowed down as it has virtually stopped. Which is why I'm asking the question whether we need to start talking about a new or revised approach, or if everyone is just happy to leave things as they are. Is nobody concerned by the fact that there's only one nominee right now? So the only choice is "vote, or don't"... I mean, we could probably find something else to moninate, but in doing so, would we just be masking the underlying issue? I'm just trying to open a discussion here, not force a change. —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 08:11, 14 December 2010 (EST)

So, it's been a few months since I commented on this situation, and essentially nothing has changed. We still have only one nominated article, which now has a mighty three votes. At this rate, next year we'll have our next new featured article, and no nominations Sarcasm aside, I'm really not comfortable with sitting around watching this process get forgotten, gather dust and die slowly. It's clearly no longer useful or fit for purpose. I feel like we either need to put something new in place, or just close voting completely. —Adam ^{[ talk ]} 16:24, 15 February 2011 (EST)

I agree, and really can't think of anything to take its place, but I wouldn't like it shut down. I really don't see any other options, though —ZENOX ^T C 17:25, 15 February 2011 (EST)

Personally, I think we can still save the Featured Article process. I think one of the problems here is people think "Featured Article" and they immediately think "BIG article!" But article size really isn't everything; an article on a minor item that was only used in one game, for example, is never going to be the same size as the Hyrule article. But if it's informative, well referenced, has good images, etc, it could still be featured. I looked over our currently featured article list: It's all MAIN characters, races, or items. I'd like to see some featured articles about lesser items/people/places!!! I think what needs to be reshaped here is the societal thinking regarding what constitutes a Feature-worthy article.

As far as the concern that the ratio of Featured articles to non-featured will be to high, using the "one in 1,120 articles" rules means we should have 3 featured articles. Matt's right, that just isn't realistic. We have 24 right now, and they're all fairly obvious ones (Ganon, Link, Zelda-- Oh look, there's three right there! I guess we're done!). —Embyr 75  ^--Talk-- 18:35, 15 February 2011 (EST)

Well, I'll just spin some ideas. We could start some improvement projects on prospect pages to get them up toe featured code. And NOT forget about the projects. We could encourage participation. My reasoning is that for editing purposes, "featured status" is primarily a motivating factor for improving pages. We could focus on pages by improving them to the point of passing the criteria for featured standards, then move to another topic. We've tried group efforts like this before, but people just forgot about them. We could improve upon that though by constantly reminding people that it's there. Such as with Facebook posts, or simply using our site-wide notice for it. If we get that going, we could conceivably get a steady stream of featured candidates. As far as speed of voting is concerned, the problem there is people forget it's there. Again we should regularly remind people that it is there, such as with the Facebook posts and site notice. Otherwise they forget. And we all need to participate more in voting ourselves.Matt ^(Talk) 02:01, February 16, 2011 (UTC)

PS: As I was looking through our larger articles, I noticed that half of our problem is, like I said, people forget about voting. The voting is not keeping up with article improvement. I put the best three I found out of many up for nomination. So now there are four up there. So really we need to stop forgetting about voting. It's not just normal users, it's us too. We need to keep up with it and keep up with the article improvement.Matt ^(Talk) 02:41, February 16, 2011 (UTC)

I just had an idea, although I doubt it will work. Perhaps we could code in voting for an article, then when a month has passed, a reminder is given to the user that they can go and vote on a featured article. It would require a lot of complex coding, so I don't know if it's really worth the effort. Alternatively, we could get a SaRIA-esque wiki group going that's dedicated to bringing articles up to featured status. There probably is one, I know there's one on removing stubs, but this one would be dedicated to getting articles to featured status, so focuses on expanding all parts of the article, not just content or references.—ZENOX ^T C 22:12, 17 February 2011 (EST)

We couldn't have features like that in voting without getting complex extensions that would take away from the discussion aspect involved in voting. An extension that would permit voting, say once a month, would probably not allow saying WHY you vote a certain way, which is extremely important. Voting for an article it's important because then we know what's valued, which also helps in knowing what other pages should look for having too. And for voting against an article it lets us know the flaws so they can be fixed. Simple yes/no voting which would be required for such a time feature wouldn't allow that.
And on the group thing, yeah, that's pretty much what I was thinking myself. Though such projects tend to die, OR people just continue them independently without any coordinating or updates. So for it to work we couldn't ignore the project page like we have with the rest. A project page will be extremely useful for this anyway as it'd let us keep track of prospective pages that need just a bit of work to be on that level.Matt ^(Talk) 06:37, February 18, 2011 (UTC)