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Administrators: Clear all reports

Errors in the summary of the featured article

Please do not remove this invisible timestamp. See WT:ERRORS and WP:SUBSCRIBE. - Dank (push to talk) 01:24, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Errors in "Did you know ..."

Current DYK

Just leaving a note here that given the right column is much shorter today than the left one (even after ITN going to five items), I've copy-edited the lead hook. The description of the date range seemed overly wordy; I axed a number of words. Schwede66 04:37, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

It's all display size dependent. There's lots of space on my laptop montior, but only a little remaining on my external monitor. —Bagumba (talk) 05:12, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I know. On a smaller display, it makes a big difference whether or not you hide the tools. On my laptop, with the tools, it's balanced. Hiding the tools makes the screen real estate bigger and I get the same amount a white space as on a big monitor.

When I balance the main page for white space, I go by my large monitor. And lets not even talk about viewing the main page via mobile phone in desktop view; there are some truly strange font settings programmed somewhere. Schwede66 05:57, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

For the last 30 days, most readers used the mobile view of the main page – about 80 million to 60 million for the desktop view. Removing agreed text for the sake of cosmetic tinkering with the desktop view is therefore improper per WP:PREFER which states "Fully protected pages may not be edited except to make changes that are uncontroversial or for which there is clear consensus." Andrew🐉(talk) 14:25, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

DYK is not displayed in the mobile app. Cielquiparle (talk) 14:55, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Next DYK

• ... that Henry Kailimai and his Hawaiian Quintet were hired by Henry Ford to serve as official musicians for the Ford Motor Company?

@Kimikel, Johnson524, Nineteen Ninety-Four guy, and RoySmith: small nitpick, but they don't seem to have been "official musicians for the Ford Motor Company" exactly. The city council journal (reliable source?) describes them only as "[Henry] Ford's resident musicians", while Ukelele doesn't mention anything of the kind. Both sources do say that they played at lots of FMC events, though. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 07:17, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

I remember looking at the sources to verify the hook, but don't remember exactly what I found. It might have been Ukulele Magazine where it says "They regularly played ... at Ford company events" and later talks about the "Ford Motor Company Music Department", which sounds official to me. RoySmith (talk) 13:02, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

I had about the same thinking as RoySmith on this one, if there's an issue I apologize. Cheers! Johnson524 14:15, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Errors in "On this day"

Today's OTD

• Today were remember the anniversary of the premiere of Mozart's last opera. We say:
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's opera The Magic Flute, composed shortly before his death, premiered at Theater auf der Wieden in Vienna.

  I believe that we can do better:

  1. This person is well known by his last name, and we don't have to mention one of his many given names, and then one he never used, - he used Wolfgangus Amadeus (when very formal or ironic) or Wolfgang Amadé. We could pipe or not link at all.
  2. The opera on the poster was called Die Zauberflöte, it was one of few operas he wrote in German while the majority was in Italien, - that was pioneering, and we could inform about that by not suggesting that it was given in English.
  3. When he wrote it he was still healthy, while "shortly before his death" sounds to me as if he was already thinking of death as when writing his Requiem. - Instead he conducted and played keyboard in the performance.
  4. I don't think the name of the theatre matters much, - few people will get from the name alone that this was not a prominent imperial or noble theatre in Vienna, but a suburban modest place of public entertainment.
  5. Vienna doesn't have to be mentioned. It is the default place for his mature years, and it is mentioned in the article about the theatre. If it is mentioned it doesn't need link, per WP:OVERLINK.

  My shortest take:

  • Mozart conducted the premiere of his last opera, Die Zauberflöte, in Vienna.

  Variant to play withs:

  • Mozart conducted the premiere of his last opera, Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute) at the Theater auf der Wieden in a suburb of Vienna.

  The opera was a great success that he enjoyed very much, but I don't know how to include it ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 05:57, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  Changed to "Mozart conducted the premiere of his last opera, The Magic Flute, in Vienna." He's pretty much always known mononymously, so the shortening makes sense, but I don't see why the name should be given in the original German when the article title (i.e. the thing we've decided most people most easily recognize) is in English. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 06:21, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  No objection to someone re-adding "shortly before his death" if they'd like, as it's still true. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 06:23, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  @Theleekycauldron: While he is the primary topic for Mozart, I'd just assume we defer to the community-supported page title, which is presumably his common name—this is a general "encyclopedia". —Bagumba (talk) 06:33, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  I'm not sure I'd agree, Bagumba. An article can be placed at a title that is not its common name; a quick google ngrams search reveals the obvious, that the vast majority of works never even mention Mozart's full name. A full 92% of Google Scholar articles that talk about Mozart never use his full name (1 2). I think the reason that Mozart's article isn't at Mozart is because it'd feel awkward and unnatural compared to other shortenings, like Bill Clinton, that feel both familiar and proper. But on the Main Page, in running prose, I think it's fair to point out that "Mozart" is the most commonly used and most recognizable title, even at first use, and the blurb should reflect that. theleekycauldron (talk • she/her) 06:41, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  @Theleekycauldron: I think we're only differing on "common name" vs. WP:COMMONAME. Cheers. —Bagumba (talk) 06:52, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  I agree that it should be "Mozart" on the main page, and not "Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart". Schwede66 08:54, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  Me too re "Mozart." But Gerda, we have to admit that in English the work is most often known as The Magic Flute, just as Mann's Der Zauberberg is known as The Magic Mountain. – Sca (talk) 12:36, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  While I admit that it would be known best as The Magic Fkute, I beg you to consider that in history it's correct to say that he composed Die Zauberflöte, and that name was on the posters, and in the libretto, and was the only name the composer knew. We have a chance to teach about that. See also 1 2, 3. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 14:54, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

  Leider, we can't expect a sizeable proportion of general readers of EngWiki to be opera aficionados. Tut mir Leid. Nun Schönen Tag noch. -- Sca (talk) 15:23, 30 September 2024 (UTC)

Errors in the summary of the featured list

Friday's FL

(October 4)

Monday's FL

(September 30, today)

Errors in the summary of the featured picture

Notice to administrators: When fixing POTD errors, please update the corresponding regular version (i.e. without "protected" in the page title) in addition to the Main Page version linked below.

General discussion

Ted Kennedy

Should be on the news section 77.234.159.97 (talk) 07:33, 26 August 2009 (UTC)

3,000,000th article soon

Is it possible to specify which will be the 3,000,000th article? / regards Bengt. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.121.84.241 (talk) 11:14, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

No. (Unless if you could see into the future :D) YOWUZA Talk 2 me! 11:43, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Start working your way through this list and you can influence destiny!—although some are a bit far-fetched/fictional. --candle•wicke 17:46, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Will there be a banner on the Main Page for the 3 millionth article? -- 70.134.85.248 (talk) 18:45, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

s'pect so. If I remember corretcly, there was one for 2 million. YOWUZA Talk 2 me! 19:24, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Will there be fireworks? Rreagan007 (talk) 21:26, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

More importantly, will there be cake? Modest Genius ^talk 22:57, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

... and beer? JIMp _talk·cont 23:20, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, there will be cake. –  LATICS  talk  04:58, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Let's please not keep it up for too long, seeing how many of those are useless stubs/needing cleanup/POV/lacking references. We'll have cake and fireworks for when we have lots of Featured/Good articles and lists. See WP:Good articles for numbers. Quality not quantity. Reywas92^Talk 23:35, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

How about store-bought sponge cake, a bon-fire & lots of cheap beer for the three million mark and save the black forest cake, the fireworks and the fine champagne for when we get to ten thousand good articles? JIMp _talk·cont

I cant wait that long for black forest cake!--Willski72 (talk) 12:05, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

THE CAKE IS A LIE!!!!! Blah42b10 (talk) 19:24, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Only around 900 articles to go... --Tone 19:35, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

The 3 millionth article will be mine. I hope you are all prepared to give me 15 minutes of Wikifame. Shii (tock) 19:46, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Hi guys, I've been working in hungarien wikipedia for a year and seven months. That will be unbelivable, 3,000,000 articles... I'm very excited about that. Good luck from Hungary. --Pakos (talk) 19:52, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Right now, only some 440 articles to go. When WP reached its 2 millionth article, several bots had been ordered to submit hundreds of stubby articles in the very last minute. Still, the winner was just another simple editor of flesh and blood... --Hapsala (talk) 22:51, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

IIRC, the reason one of those Spanish village stubs didn't make it as number two million is because the people deciding on the two millionth article didn't necessary pick exactly THE two millionth, nor was there even a flawless way to determine which article was exactly number two million. People involved in the process looked at the articles submitted in the few seconds surrounding the milestone, and picked a topic which was started with good, well-researched information and had additional potential. There may have even been a brief vote among the community (probably on this very talk page) between three or four reasonable candidates. This is the way it should be, IMO, as article milestones aren't about which article was first to be that number (what if it's CSD material?), but about the quality of the project itself. --Rave bmp (talk) 02:23, 17 August 2009 (UTC) (former well-established editor)

When we know, it should be noted what article is #3 million. - Jørgen88 (talk) 03:13, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I say we go create a bunch of BS articles until it hits 3M. :P –  LATICS  talk  03:51, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I bet thats already in progress xD I'd like to see something like 80's sunglasses or List of famous people with a mullet. I got that inspiration by listening to Richard Marx :-D Jørgen88 (talk) 03:57, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

You know what, there are only about 100 or 10 more articles until it reaches 3,000,000! December21st2012Freak (talk • contribs) 04:04, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

It just reached over 3,000,000 articles. December21st2012Freak (talk • contribs) 04:06, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

And thus, it is done. Now where's my cake? —ᚹᚩᛞᛖᚾᚻᛖᛚᛗ (ᚷᛖᛋᛈᚱᛖᚳ) 04:07, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

• Note: The 3 millionth article was determined to be Beate Eriksen. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 04:07, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I should been hardnosed, opened up 20 stubs with 20 pre-created stubs and pressed enter :((( YellowMonkey (bananabucket!) 04:10, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Thank God that it was a real article and not some crap! Smartse (talk) 04:15, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Who "determined" it? Can you point us to the discussion? Anyway, here are the candidates for 3 millionth:

1. 22:04, 16 August 2009 ‎Druid's bend (hist) ‎[2,199 bytes] ‎Catfooddogfood (talk | contribs | block) (←Created page with 'The Druid's Bend, also known as The Celtic's Bend, is a celtic knot, dating from antiquity, which was once used to secure and haul the [[sto...')
2. 22:04, 16 August 2009 ‎Portuguese Fireplace (hist) ‎[2,407 bytes] ‎Simply south (talk | contribs | block) (←Created page with 'The Portuguese Fireplace is a war memorial in the New Forest National Park, near to the village of Lyndhurst, Hampshire, United Kingdom. ...')
3. 22:04, 16 August 2009 ‎Beate Eriksen (hist) ‎[2,085 bytes] ‎Lampman (talk | contribs | block) (←Created page with '{{Infobox actor | name = Beate Eriksen | image = | imagesize = | caption = | birthname = B...')
4. 22:04, 16 August 2009 ‎Manor House (Chicago, Illinois) (hist) ‎[1,690 bytes] ‎Zagalejo (talk | contribs | block) (start)
5. 22:04, 16 August 2009 ‎Nichiji (hist) ‎[3,888 bytes] ‎Shii (talk | contribs | block) (←Created page with 'Nichiji (日持; February 10, 1250–after 1304), also known as Kaikō, was a Buddhist disciple of Nichiren who traveled to Hokkaido, [[Siberi...')

Shii (tock) 04:11, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Wait until it reaches 4,000,000 articles... December21st2012Freak (talk • contribs) 04:14, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

It looks like User:Abyssal was prepared. Abyssal created about 15 articles all around 4:05 on ancient fossils. Danski14^(talk) 04:16, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Wasn't Umbeloceras the 3,000,000th article? --Hapsala (talk) 04:21, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

The rate of article creation jumped so high at that point. what a fun contest. 2,999,997 to 3,000,033 before and after I created articles then checked special:statistics. clickpop (talk) 04:22, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

No, X! (talk · contribs) wrote a temporary bot that found Beate Eriksen to be 3M. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 04:25, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Ah, ok I'll take your word on that... Do you think the WMF will be doing a press release? I suspect so as they did for the 2 millionth. Danski14^(talk) 04:28, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Wait until it reaches 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 articles in the way future. December21st2012Freak (talk • contribs) 04:26, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Comment: I was here at this time (just for historic reference). Who ate all the cake? :( --candle•wicke 04:39, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Figures it'd be a stub, and on someone I've never hear of before :) Question: does this 3,000,000 article crowning take into account articles merged/deleted before it? I mean obviously this is not going to be problem in a few days, but as we all know there are some articles that get created that end up deleted or merged within a few minutes of creation, and I wouldn't mind knowing if this gets factored into the 3 million calculation statistics. TomStar81 (Talk) 04:54, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

No, it just marks the first time {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} exceeded 3M. Icewedge (talk) 05:29, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Out of curiosity then will an award or mention or something be given to the article that holds the 3,000,000 mark after all the adjustment stuff mentioned above gets sorted out? Or will the adjusted article and contributor behind it end up forgotten in a corner some where so to speak. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.211.107.172 (talk) 05:47, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

 Cargoking  talk  has given everyone some WikiCake! This is a special cake to celebrated the 3,000,000^th article. Bon appetit!

Spread the tastiness of cakes by adding {{subst:GiveCake}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Many congratulations--Ezzex (talk) 10:46, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

76.211.107.172, that would not be possible to calculate, as it would be ever-changing. Even since the article was created, many others will have been deleted, redirected, merged and so on, meaning that, already, it is not technically the 3,000,000th article. Our compromise is to list the first article to be listed as the 3,000,000th as our 3,000,000th- even though it is probably only so for a few minutes at most. J Milburn (talk) 11:43, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe we should be focusing on even 3000 FA articles instead.... Dr. Blofeld ^{White cat} 12:18, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Or 3 million AfDs! Lugnuts (talk) 12:26, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I couldn't agree with you more, Dr. Blofeld, but you don't seem to be the kind of person to be saying that. You and your closest associates have created tens of thousands of those useless one-line stubs. Reywas92^Talk 21:09, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Oh missed the cake! I was looking forward to that too! I've got be quicker at these things!--Willski72 (talk) 13:11, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Oh 3000,0001st! Simply south (talk) 21:53, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Too bad my bet didn't make it. Bloody internet-less work. LOL –Howard the Duck 08:30, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I insist that this accomplishment be marked with an asterisk until such time as testing confirms that Lampman was not cheating by using performance enhancing drugs to increase his editing capabilities. GaryColemanFan (talk) 17:46, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I am sorry to rain on the party but article number is nothing to celebrate. We may have three million articles but the quality is shocking on some, majbe a majority, of them. I spend a lot of my time fixing up bad edits, bad categorisation, getting stuff deleted, adding stub articles that should exist, correcting spelling, etc. When are we going to get fully fledged flagged revisions up and running to improve the quality of WP? With flagged revisions the quality will improve dramicially. I think. Am having trouble finding an analysis of the German WP experience with flagged revisions. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 05:42, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Everybody knows that. Nobody cares. Big Round Number! Hurray!. APL (talk) 16:28, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Well I care. I have created Wikipedia:WikiProject Flagged Revisions‎‎ for those that do. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 20:26, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Flagged revisions run completely contrary to the concept of a wiki. More importantly, they are not related to the Main Page and so this is not the right place to discuss them. Modest Genius ^talk 22:53, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Well to be fair I think the 3 millionth article doesn't really have much to do with the main page either so it's perhaps questionable if this is really the right place to discuss that either. True we did mention it on the mainpage, but the discussion has long since moved on from that and was barely about that anyway. Under some proposals the main page will have flagged revs so it is marginally connected just as the 3 millionth article thing Nil Einne (talk) 06:14, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Clarification : I only meant that nobody cares in relation to celebrating a big round number. Obviously, for articles 2,999,999 and 3,000,001 quality is more important than quantity. APL (talk) 00:21, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

  3M is a brand.
  Brent.---Brent4000 (talk) 13:46, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

  Here is your new article. 3M 2M 1M. 0M.

Write OTD entries in present tense

Proposing this here as it gets substantially more traffic than the Selected Anniversaries talk page. I propose that the OTD entries are phrased in the present tense. Most "on this day in history"-type articles and documentaries I've seen use the present tense when describing events. It seems more natural - if you put yourself in 1930 (for example) and talk about events unfolding in front of you - to use the present tense to describe things as they happen. Also, it greatly reduces verbiage and avoids potentially awkward past tense constructs such as "had had" (amongst others), especially in entries long enough to contain multiple such instances. Thoughts? (Should this go on the Village Pump? Is there a better place for this discussion?) Zunaid 21:03, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Oppose. These are events from the past, not the present. The reason why other sites use present tense is that they are usually links to contemporary reports, not retrospective encyclopaedia articles. The articles themselves are written in past tense. Modest Genius ^talk 22:51, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

• As stated on the top of WP:OTD, they are in past tense "due to the fact that the Main Page has current events [ITN] and past ones on the same page". Zzyzx11 (Talk) 00:40, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

What about the controversy surrounding Caster Semenya, the South African athlete?--41.246.105.58 (talk) 12:35, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

What about her? --candle•wicke 23:20, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Why has the Main Page...

....still not been moved to Wikipedia:Main_Page? What opposition is there to moving it from the main namespace?----occono (talk) 18:36, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Status quo. In most forms of debate, it is incumbent on the person proposing a change to make a substantial, convincing case for the change. Usually it is not necessary for advocates of the status quo to provide arguments to keep things the way they are - in the absence of widespread consensus that the change is warranted, things stay the way they have been. Granted, in the absence of opposition, the bar for a convincing rationale is low, but one must still be fronted - rarely does "change for change's sake" occur. - So the real question is not what opposition is there, but how will moving the page markedly improve Wikipedia? (What harm does leaving it have, or what benefit would moving it bring?) Simply stated, the opposition is that the reasons for moving haven't been stated convincingly enough yet. -- 128.104.112.102 (talk) 19:37, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Another reason is that such discussions always seem to eventually die, and archived, with no clear consensus. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 19:42, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

FAQ. Dabomb87 (talk) 21:19, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Actually I have read that, I was sort of looking for a status update on the issue.----occono (talk) 22:08, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I suppose the question is then, why does this need to be moved? Obviously, the previous issues raised haven't caused enough problems. Dabomb87 (talk) 22:32, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

The main reason to not move it is because there are lots of links to it. So 'Main Page' would have to be a redirect anyway, so what is the point? Prodego ^talk 22:34, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

No, Main Page should be a redirect to Homepage if it were to happen, with a message saying For Wikipedia's home page, see Wikipedia:Main Page. there or something like that.----occono (talk) 22:59, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

But that would be counterproductive, as most editors who would type in "Main page" would be looking for Wikipedia's main page. There's still the question of why we need to change namespaces in the first place. Dabomb87 (talk) 23:07, 20 August 2009 (UTC) Dabomb87 (talk) 23:07, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, it would be nice to not greet users with a portal in the article namespace (thereby confusing/misleading them to believe that such pages belong there). One would think that we'd want to set a good example here (and introduce readers to the "portal" concept), yes? —David Levy 23:15, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Are you suggesting that most casual readers understand the concept of namespaces? And if they do, are incapable of realising that this is an exception to the rule? Modest Genius ^talk 23:33, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm saying that we shouldn't actively reinforce a misunderstanding regarding namespaces by leaving our most viewed page in the wrong one. I'm also noting that a move to Portal:Wikipedia or similar would introduce readers to the concept of portals. —David Levy 23:41, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

That would be massively disruptive, and it's never going to happen. In fact, the belief that Main Page would be reassigned instead of serving as a redirect to the main page's new location (based on a combination of actual proposals to that effect and assumptions that this would occur) appears to be the primary stumbling block that inevitably causes knee-jerk opposition and leads to a lack of consensus. —David Levy 23:15, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I actually asked this more out of curiousity then a desire to see the change. I was just interested in the issue after reading the FAQ. I actually don't feel it would be that disruptive, but it's not something I'm pushing for. I just like asking unresolved questions :)----occono (talk) 23:22, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

To be clear, I wholeheartedly support the idea of moving the main page out of the article namespace. In mentioning disruption, I'm referring strictly to the idea of reassigning the Main Page title (instead of retaining a redirect to the page's new location). As I said, this is the sticking point that inevitably derails the move proposal. —David Levy 23:41, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Ah, well I suppose doing that first and leaving it like that until it's not a problem anymore would be fine.----occono (talk) 23:50, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't believe that a proposal to move the main page can have any chance of succeeding unless it includes the explicit condition that the title Main Page would permanantly redirect to the new location. —David Levy 01:24, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Then I would support that.----occono (talk) 01:50, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Not broken, don't fix it Modest Genius ^talk 23:33, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

A page needn't be broken to be improved. —David Levy 23:41, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

That's a stub essay (not policy) with no talk page. It seems to exist just to say "Stop being pedantic." I shall carry on with my controversial questions and ruffling of feathers! :) (I kid.) ----occono (talk) 23:53, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

So? A good idea is a good idea, regardless of where it is written. Modest Genius ^talk 15:26, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I disagree with that old Aphorism a lot, because something doesn't have to be broken to be improved, plus switching Main Page and Wikipedia:Main Page or Portal:Main Page wouldn't exactly require tremendous effort on anyone's part...My point is I disagree with that applying here, and because it's not policy it can't shut me up. Nah Nah Nah Nah-Nah. (I'm just being funny. Your mileage may vary.)----occono (talk) 18:02, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

WP:IAR ;) 86.140.40.230 (talk) 13:11, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

This will basically never happen since millions of outside sites link to the main page. million of people have it saved in favs many more have it set as their homepage. I really see no reason strong enough to disrupt all that. Main Page is not ur avg article that can just be changed. this kind of page can usually not be changed on any big site unless maybe if there was a spelling mistake in name or something lol. at most it will be a redirect which is fairly useless imo. -- Ashish-g55 01:51, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't understand this argument. With Main Page redirecting to the new location, every link in existence would continue to function exactly as before. The displayed page would be identical; because of special code that's already in place, there wouldn't even be a "(Redirected from Main Page)" notice. To see what I mean, visit Portal:Wikipedia or Wikipedia:Main page, both of which currently redirect to Main Page.

So what disruption do you foresee? —David Levy 03:40, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

hmm, maybe you misunderstood. i was opposing original idea. i said redirection is only thing that will work but i find that useless... it wont disrupt anything i just dont see much use of it. -- Ashish-g55 12:52, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Ah, okay. Well, I've noted some of the benefits above. —David Levy 13:17, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

If Main Page were to remain a redirect forever (as required for the reasons above), there is no redirection notice and no page title, and the URL stays the same in the address bar, what possible point would there be? Modest Genius ^talk 15:26, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

The deletionists inclusionists purists would've won? –Howard the Duck 15:45, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Users arriving at the main page via www.wikipedia.org, an interwiki link not specifying the page title, our software interface (e.g. by clicking the logo or "Main page" link), and any internal/external link that was updated (though this would not be essential) would see the new URL (which search engines would pick up as well). Everyone would see the new URL and page title at the corresponding talk page (this one). —David Levy 16:14, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Do we know if any significant amounts of users actually come through www.wikipedia.org? To me it seems quite useless to pass through there and click English instead of going straight to here./Coffeeshivers (talk) 17:11, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't have the statistics in front of me (so hopefully someone can cite them), but yes, many users (particularly those who don't know the direct URL) visit the English Wikipedia that way. It's the top Google result for "Wikipedia" and the page reached when someone types "wikipedia.org" in the address bar.

Of course, if the main page were moved, users typing "en.wikipedia.org" (or following such a link) also would reach the new URL (which would quickly replace the old URL in search engines).

Only users typing or following a link specifically to the title "Main Page" would continue to reach the old URL, and for them, there would be absolutely no change to the page. —David Levy 17:34, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I think the better question to ask is as David Levy has hinted at, how do people actually come to the Main Page? If you come by www./wikipedia.org as DL has said you end up at the new page. If you come by typing in, a link to, or a bookmark to en.wikipedia.org, you end up at the right place. The only time you end up at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page is if you follow a link, type it in or have a bookmark. Let's analyse these carefully. If you follow a link, things are not going to change immediately since many aren't going to update their links. But many people will over time and sites which don't may die or become of far less interest. I suspect many directories will, search engines will (it's their job), even commercial sites that aren't really directories probably will. Personal websites will probably take the longest of all. But how many people actually follow such links, and how many actually link to the main page as opposed to en.wikipedia.org? I don't have statistics, but I suspect the number isn't that high. What about bookmarks? Well there are probably a few of these. If you create a bookmark (for convience sake let's include those using Firefoxes fancy web suggestion and similar things here) you'll probably create it at Main_Page for now. These aren't going to change. And there's probably a fair few with these although again no statistics. But how long will these last? As people reinstall their OS, upgrade computer etc, some may keep their old stuff, many will just start afresh. And very likely most of these will end up at any new page, since the most likely way you'll get to there is using www./wikipedia, by typing in the en.wikipedia.org or following a search which will take you to the new main page address. And if you don't create your bookmark but rather your browser, OS, whatever comes with it, it's likely the person will likewise create it with the new page, or perhaps even they've always used en.wikipedia.org. And things like the Firefox web suggestion thing may or may not learn on it's own as well. Finally what about people who type in the full address? Well how many are there actually? Perhaps I'm mistaken, but I can't see any reason for them to be a lot. When I want to get to the main page, I just type in en.wikipedia.org. Why bother with the extra stuff? In other words, it seems to me in 1 year, it's easily possible perhaps even likely 75%+ of people will be hitting the new address and with in 5 years, 99%+. Indeed it wouldn't surprise me if in 5 years the majority of people hitting the old address are those who never liked the change and so refused to adjust. In other words, most people will be seeing the correct address. BTW, I'm pretty sure if you look at one of the old discussions, I established that the default page for www.microsoft.com had changed at least once over the years, and possibly other sites. Indeed I'm pretty sure it was something like index.html or index.htm which does not even exist or redirect anymore. In other words, the idea that some people seem to have that a big site is not able to change their default page without bringing down the internet is a myth. Perhaps this is an exaggeration but it does seem to me many people make way to big a deal over what will basically be a change most people aren't going to notice, but yet will pervade the internet until few even remember the 'old days'. Indeed I strongly suspect that many web designers will laugh at how much of an issue this is for us. This doesn't of course justify a move in itself, but IMHO this does establish that any discussion which starts off on the premise that we might as well keep things as they are because most people are still going to be visiting the old address OR the idea the change is going to cause major problems for users or for wikipedia is so clearly on the wrong track. Just for clarification, I'm not saying this is a minor change which should be undertaken lightly. P.S. Google gives 8,580 pages linking to en.wikipedia.org or the Main Page (treated as same thing); 1,520 for en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama; 2,100 for link:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki; 59,600 to www./wikipedia.org; 54,600 for www./microsoft.com; 569,000 for www./google.com Nil Einne (talk) 19:59, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Nil Einne, I agree with your points (why I think people are overexaggerating how disruptive it would be), but please break that into easier-to-read paragraphs as you see fit :) ----occono (talk) 20:38, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

woh! thats an article in itself lol. -- Ashish-g55 22:49, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

One idea has been to eliminate the page title completely from the URL. The logo, etc. would lead to http://en.wikipedia.org/ or http://en.wikiepdia.org/wiki/ and that would be the Main Page. You'd still have to edit the page somewhere obviously, though.... --MZMcBride (talk) 22:59, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Featured articles and biographies

Just couldn't help but notice that a preponderance of FA on the main page are biographies. I would hope that Wikipedia have more variety of content for FA on the main page. I'm sure there's a wider variety of FA that would be suitable for the main page. I'm not saying that there isn't other content that is being left out, but I am saying that there just seem to be more biographies than other types of articles. Hires an editor (talk) 14:16, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but this is a perennial complaint (or comment) and is generally met with "FAs are FAs and will all be on the main page, it's a case of which articles are most contributed to". It seems that biographies, music articles and video games crop up a lot on the main page, but the content is generally quite varied.  GARDEN  15:16, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

See WP:BIAS. Become a member of the project if you're concerned. 79.71.124.92 (talk) 16:01, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Thus far, out the 24 FAs chosen this month, 8 are biographies, whereas Wikiproject Biography has 726979 articles out of 3 million articles on Wikipedia. So, approximately 24.23% of articles on the site have been identified as biographies, where 1/3, or 33.333 (repeating)%, of FAs this month have been biographies. So, FA this month only contains two more biographies than would be nearly the same proportion of biographies on Wikipedia. In reality, the project has more than 24.23% biographies, as not all biographies are marked with a bio wikiproject banner, so the proportion of FAs is not entirely out of line. Cheers! Scapler (talk) 15:51, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

New section: Help Wikipedia

I'm no sure if this has been discussed before or not - apologies if it has been as I couldn't find it in the search.

The Main Page is what many people first look at when they come to Wikipedia, even if that's only passing through whilst searching for a specific article. Looking at the page layout, it strikes me that the main sections - Featured Article, Featured Picture, Did You Know, On This Day and In The News are all about sharing the best content that Wikipedia has created.

It might be a good idea to have a main section which focusses on encouraging people, particularly new editors, to help out with the project - pull as well as push. It could also encourage more experienced editors to branch out into new areas. This might take content from WP:T and that page could be used to nominate front page sections. It could be rotating in a similar way (job of the day??) and might cover things like:

• Writing your first article
• Requested articles
• Requested maps
• Requested photographs
• Cleaning up articles
• WikiProjects

Rather than make the Main Page longer, I suggest one of the existing sections is dropped or combined - have we any way of knowing which sections are most popular? Alternatively, you could just have smaller sections - not sure we need quite such a long Featured Article excerpt or quite so many Did You Know entries, for instance. What do you think? AndrewRT(Talk) 15:32, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

I would rather add a link to WP:T next to the "Overview · Editing · Questions · Help" links near the top, or add some of the links you suggest to the "Other areas of Wikipedia" section below the Today's featured picture section. Any proposal to have one of the existing sections dropped or combined would expect some heavy resistance, especially from those who contribute to them a lot. And we've already had lots of previous discussions and proposals of adding more sections to the Main Page (such as a featured list of the day). Zzyzx11 (Talk) 15:55, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

It isn't an accident. The general consensus is that the main page should be for our readers not our editors. Therefore putting an entire new section to encourage new editors is likely to be controversial to say the least Nil Einne (talk) 18:48, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Note that "anyone can edit" in the slogan is linked to Wikipedia:Introduction and "Editing" just below that is linked to Wikipedia:Tutorial. However, the dedicated page for existing editors to find something new to do is Wikipedia:Community portal and I don't see that changing much, if at all. - BanyanTree 04:01, 26 August 2009 (UTC)