User:Red Hawk One/Sandbox 2

Featured Artice/Did You Know on main page

A major part of my proposed main page improvement is the addition of a Did you know and Featured article box, which is present on virtually every other wiki. Theoretically, this would mean that 5-10 DYK and one FA would be chosen by random and placed on the main page every week. I say "theoretically" because the pool for both sources is extremely low, and history suggests that any attempt to revitalize these pools would be short lived at best.

However, there still may be ways to work this out.

Featured Articles

To contribute to the proposed FA system, feel free to post here.

It seems clear that, despite looking good on paper, the current featured article system is not working. It was over six months after the current system was suggested that the first vote was called, and another four since then without any votes. As a counter-proposal, I suggest we adopt a system similar to Wikipedias'. The system would work out something like this:

1. The Good Article Category would serve as the FA pool. A new article would be featured each week.
   • Any page suggested and passed on UDWiki:Featured Articles/Good Articles would become a FA nominee.
2. If no significant discussion is made on upcoming FA's, the system would default to a pre-determined and random queue. This is to prevent problems such as the current abandonment.
3. The queue would expand 1-2 months in advance (4-8 articles), with new articles being assigned at random. Users would be able to influence this by suggesting additional GAs to add to the queue, or petition to have the queue changed/shuffled.
4. UDWiki:Featured Articles/Voting would become obsolete, and would be best replaced by a queue page much like This.
5. In order to be featured, an article must have an appropriate opening statement (or a substitute written) and preferably a related image.

By instituting a randomized system, we would insure that there would be a featured article, even if the community looses interest (which history shows it inevitably will).

Citations:

• Wikipedia:Today's featured article/January 2010 - an example of a FA queue. Note that one on the UDWiki would likely be organized by weeks, not days. May be a place to finalize the visible blurb.
• Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests - The wikipedia system for finalizing and/or changing queued FA's. The point system is a clever, and potentially adaptable tool. May serve as a model to base our system off of.
• User:Red Hawk One/Sandbox 1 - Proposed addition of a FA box to the Main Page.

Questions:

• How should the backup (random queue) system be run? Should an individual user be appointed to chair the project (like Wikipedia)? Should it be controlled by sysops? Should it be openly run by anyone?
• Should users supply a FA opening blurb with their nomination for GA?
• What happens if the pool is exhausted?
• Should there be restrictions on what can qualify as a FA candidate (possibly causing a GA-FA split)?

Thank you for taking the time to read this. I am sure that many of you, like myself, would love to see Featured Articles as a working project.--~ Red Hawk One ^{Talk | space for lease} 05:14, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Did You Know

would operate on a similar manner to the current system. Facts would be suggested to the DYK page and, if no problem is found with them, would be added to the pool. Each week, 5-10 facts (number depending on the available pool size) would be chosen at random and placed on the DYK template.

Possible GA canidates

Because of these proposed changes, we will meed MUCH more than the current amount of GA's. In order to add to the list, while still keeping the system smooth, I'll be proposing new pages for the category in groups of ~5, and keeping other prospects listed here. There are a few guidelines I'm looking at:

1. The article must be informative or humorous.
2. The article is well designed or is pleasing to look at.
3. Group, suburb, and User: pages are discouraged. An exceptional example of one of these pages may pass, but it is very unlikely.

If you want to suggest an article for Good Article status, feel free to add it to this list, or better yet, suggest it here!

• featured guides
• Danger Alley
• The Upshall Monument
• Category:Malls and/or Mall
• The Whitlock Building
• Curton Mansion
• Malton
• Monroeville
• Borehamwood
• St. Jude's Cathedral
• Caiger Mall
• First Siege of Caiger Mall