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Forums > Consensus track archive > Major changes for FA and GA review boards

This page is an archive of the discussion about changes for the FA and GA review boards. The result was to enact Proposal One. Drewton ^{(Drewton's Holocron)} 18:03, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

A very good issue has been brought to my attention tonight, and that relates to Featured articles. Right now, we’ve lost a lot. I definitely wouldn’t say that’s a bad thing in one respect because those that are no longer Featured articles were not up to current standards. In the other respect, though, there’s really not enough new Featured articles coming in to continue the upcoming articles list. Right now, we have roughly a month’s worth of Featured articles left. I don’t even want to imagine what would happen if we ran out. Can you imagine how embarrassing that would be not having anymore and not knowing what to do in that situation? I’d rather not imagine that.

A few suggestions have been given to me, and I’ve mulled them over. One of them was to lower the Featured article requirements. I completely disagree with that idea, because even though they’re difficult they are nowhere near impossible and they prevent nonsense and Mary Sue articles, among other things, from become Featured articles in their current form. Besides, it’s evident that toned down requirements weren’t working, which is why we all voted to approve these current standards to begin with.

So you may be asking right now, what is Brandon thinking about this? What is his opinion on what we should do? Well, my opinion, and the opinion of certain others, is that there are not enough Decreton Lords to continue with Featured article nominations. Right now, there are currently five Decreton Lords. As if that wasn’t a low and pathetic enough number to begin with, there’s not really five active members. Solus is off at college now, and that’s completely understandable as she’s getting acclimated and it takes a few weeks to get into a new routine before you have time for things like this. No one has any idea what Jasca is up to, so that really only leaves Ataru, MPK and me. That’s not enough. It’s nowhere near enough.

Although they have many more Featured article nominations, look at Wookieepedia. They have eighteen Inquisitors. Yes, that’s right: eighteen Inquisitors. That means there is the potential for eighteen people to be reviewing one article. I find that to be an entirely reasonable and perhaps overly reasonable number because it really cuts down on the pressure that the members feel. The more of you there are on a team, the less there is on everyone’s shoulders. Although we obviously won’t be getting thirty Decreton Lords anytime soon, we can still increase our number.

From here on out in this proposal, I’m going to refer to Decreton Lords as the “Featured article review board” and the High Priests as the “Good article review board”. This is for a very specific purpose which you will see shortly. I have two proposals that I would like to see you all vote for. Please do so and discuss the options as great length if need be.

Remember, the Voting policy applies here: you must have one hundred (100) mainspace (article) edits to vote in policy proposals. You must sign your posts, you must be logged into an account, and so forth. This proposal will last for two weeks, until September 25th, unless it needs to be shortened or lengthened in which case it will be. Anyway, please read over the two proposals and then discuss. As a note, if you support one proposal, you may also oppose the other. - Brandon Rhea ^{(talk) (contribs)} 06:33, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Current standingsEdit

Proposal One (14)
Proposal Two (0)

Proposal OneEdit

The Featured article review board and the Good article review board should be merged into one new review board that encompasses both Good article and Featured article reviews. This new board would serve in the same capacity as the current two, only it would be responsible for managing both Good articles and Featured articles rather than having two boards for each one. The members, according to the current rosters of both boards, would be as follows:

That would give us ten members for this review board and, based on the current High Priest election, it’s likely that we’ll be adding a eleventh if someone else is nominated. It should be noted that while the members of this group will still be the only ones to vote on Featured article nominations, all members will still be able to vote on Good article nominations. That aspect would not change. The only real difference is the board that helps to oversee them.

Once this new group is established, they will decide on a name. It can be the Decreton Lords, the High Priests or even Barney and Friends. It does not particularly matter. It’s whatever they feel works best for the new group. After three (3) months of activity, this group will hold a discussion to see where they are at in improving the amount of Featured articles we have and how the review process is working for both Good articles and Featured articles.

If the group believes that it can split into two once again and the Wiki can afford to have separate Good article and Featured article review boards, the group will compile their reasons and propose it to the membership of the Wiki as a new proposal. Because of the potential for this, the High Priest and Decreton Lord pages would remain intact, just in case it was decided that those two separate boards would be brought back.

SupportEdit

I believe that this is the better of my two proposals. It’s important to maintain oversight over Good articles, because I think many of us can agree that there are some Good articles that are not up to Good article quality. This requires a larger group of members to carry out an adequate review of Good articles (ones that are not Featured articles at the time of the review). Not only that, but there is still a tendency for many members to support Good article nominations if it just appears to “look good”. With a review board, a respectable review of each article can be carried out in a timely and efficient manner. Therefore, I definitely believe that this is the way we should be going at this point. - Brandon Rhea ^{(talk) (contribs)} 06:33, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
I think this is the better of the two as well. Per Brandon. --Kathkira^talk 06:59, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
Yes. Good idea Brandon. If this will get the FAReviews and GANominations done faster, hell yeah! As for the name....Board of Reviewers? House of Reviewers? --Arav the Undersith ^{(Contact Me) (My contributions)} 10:51, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
- It doesn't matter right now. That will be up for the board members to decide. - Brandon Rhea ^{(talk) (contribs)} 02:03, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Decreton Priests? High Lords? Drewton ^{(Drewton's Holocron)} 12:32, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, it never made sense for High Priests to exist when all users can vote on good articles. The only difference between any user and a High Priest was that a High Priest may feel obligated to vote on good articles (although High Priest have more reviewing talents than the average user). It'll be better if it was just one group. --Michaeldsuarez ^{(Talk) (Deeds)} 15:52, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
- That was originally the case, but not after awhile. The High Priests were eventually put in charge of holding "HP Good article reviews" like how DLs do FA reviews, and they could also block an article from becoming a Good article if it was not up to standards, despite what the general members would have said. - Brandon Rhea ^{(talk) (contribs)} 02:03, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Support. This idea makes sense and will help alleviate the FA crunch the wiki is experiencing. Also, there's only 18 Inqs on Wookieepedia, Rhea. Atarumaster88 ^{(Talk page)} 16:08, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
- Dear me, I have no idea why I wrote thirty. - Brandon Rhea ^{(talk) (contribs)} 02:03, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Yep. -- ^{(talk) (contributions)} 16:45, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
Excellent idea. Abolish the hierarchy; reviewers are reviewers. --C3PO the Dragon Slayer ^{6,000,000 forms of communication | Dragons I've Slayed} 21:10, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
- What do you mean "abolish the hierarchy"? Everything is going to work exactly how it is now, except there will be one board encompassing FAs and GAs instead of one for each. - Brandon Rhea ^{(talk) (contribs)} 22:21, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
Yup, sounds good. Vagrant Lustoid ^(Talk) 12:03, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Too many soldiers have died... Too many lost to the guns of time. We're defending a sinking ship, men... but we've still got spackle for the hull breaches. -MPK ^{(MPK's Talk Page)} 14:01, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
I'm not on this list? Well, that's nice... — JM 76 ^Ask _Archives 20:45, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Absolutely. The current Decreton Lords run as fast as the Louisiana State Legislative, and that is one slow donkey. Wing ^msg 13:59, 13 September 2008 (UTC)
Per above. -Solus^{(Bird of Prey)} 11:15, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
I guess. Unit 8311 ^(Talk) 15:35, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
I prefer this one out of the two. -- You Speak, I've Spoken 05:01, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

NeutralEdit

OpposeEdit

Questions/commentsEdit

And so this new board, if the proposal passes, would be able to vote on the Third FAR? -- ^{(talk) (contributions)} 16:48, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

That will very likely be over by the time this passes, but even then I'd actually prefer if the current Decreton Lords just finished that off themselves, even if this new system is put into place. I say this only because we have a working system in place that's getting it done quickly, efficiently and effectively, and I don't want to screw with that in any way. - Brandon Rhea ^{(talk) (contribs)} 04:45, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
Just to clarify, would the number of required votes for FAs change? Unit 8311 ^(Talk) 15:38, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes. The number of required FA votes is whatever the majority is. - Brandon Rhea ^{(talk) (contribs)} 15:45, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

So many votes. I didn't know we had that many members. -MPK ^{(MPK's Talk Page)} 12:43, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

MPK, I like your metaphor about the sinking ship above. It's what I've been thinking for a while. -- Joe Butler (Obi Maul12) ^(Chow) 21:35, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I've found that a well-placed metaphor can greatly help when trying to drive a point home. -MPK ^{(MPK's Talk Page)} 00:46, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Proposal TwoEdit

The Featured article review board and the Good article review board should be merged into one new review board. However, unlike Proposal One, this will only be a Featured article review board. With this proposal, a Good article review board would no longer exist and it would be up to Good article voters to decide as regular members rather than as regular members alongside members of a review board.

This new Featured article review board would look exactly the same as the current one, only with an obvious increase in number of members. The members, according to the current rosters of both boards, would be as follows:

That would give us ten members for this review board and, based on the current High Priest election, it’s likely that we’ll be adding a eleventh if someone else is nominated, as that will likely have results before this new system is adopted (assuming Proposal Two beats Proposal One). It should be noted that the members of this group will still be the only ones to vote on Featured article nominations.

Once this new group is established, they will decide on a name. It can be the Decreton Lords, the High Priests or even Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends. It does not particularly matter. It’s whatever they feel works best for the new group. After three (3) months of activity, this group will hold a discussion to see where they are at in improving the amount of Featured articles we have and how the review process is working for both Good articles and Featured articles.

If the group believes that it can split into two once again and the Wiki can afford to have separate Good article and Featured article review boards, the group will compile their reasons and propose it to the membership of the Wiki as a new proposal. Because of the potential for this, the High Priest and Decreton Lord pages would remain intact, just in case it was decided that those two separate boards would be brought back.