Wikipedia:WikiProject Vital Articles
This is a WikiProject, an area for focused collaboration among Wikipedians. New participants are welcome; please feel free to participate!
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Ask yourselves: why didn't you look up Wikipedia's articles about economy, Dmitri Mendeleev, man, or land even though you know little about them? Simple, because they suck. Millions of people feel the same way too. This is not acceptable on our side and this must be changed by making these articles good.
Subpages
edit- Wikipedia:WikiProject Vital Articles/Tools - technical how-to on how to use tools and scripts
Past work
edit- 30 kB drive
- 47 articles expanded to 30 kilobytes; 26 July 2022 – 31 August 2022
- Vital GA Drive
- Land to good article status, unsuccessful; 1 September – 15 November 2022
Function
editThis WikiProject is designed to be a public space that has neat stuff to do or learn about, and to serve as a place where you sit down, relax, and make edits or discuss with others. Its purpose is to improve the Vitals articles and lists. We always welcome anonymous and new people here (and if you are one of them, have a chat at the talk page!)
There is no such thing as "joining" or "registering" for this WikiProject, as it is an overarching project that aims to gather other WikiProjects together for collaboration. If you're actively improving vital articles, you're already a member of this WikiProject. If you want to find people that are working on Vital articles, use this link to find recent edits and talk to them directly.
Tasks
edit- Wikipedia:Database reports/Vital articles update report
- No backlogUnassessed vital articles – -2 articles in total
- No backlogVital articles with unknown topic – 0 articles in total
A list of articles needing cleanup associated with this project is available. See also the tool's wiki page and the index of WikiProjects.
Improving a Vital article
editWhile we might not know the exact formula for mass-producing Vital GAs, we do know ways to tackle and improve these kind of articles. Here are some techniques that you can use:
- Don't be afraid to try and don't be a perfectionist. Yes, that paragraph that you just wrote might not be there once the article is at GAN, but it will be an important stepping stone for recognizing further improvement. As long as your own content is significantly better and more reliable than the rest of the article, you've done a good job.
- Be concise and keep the summary style in mind. An article should not be too long or else the readers will become dizzy (~60 kB of readable prose is the ideal size). Pro tip: one of the best way to quickly raise article quality is to trim bad content, such as cruft, unsourced sections, original research, etc.
- Be mindful of systematic bias. For vital articles specifically, the most commonly encountered bias is American-European bias. For example, there's a tendency of using European allegories or paintings to illustrate abstract ideas. Don't just swap these images for the sake of diversity however. Remember, the best images are the one that is relevant, high-resolution, sharp, shows the subject clearly in the small thumbnail and is applicable to all cultures.
- Patrol sources and ensure their quality. If you find a low-quality source, either replace it with higher-quality ones or jank the content if it doesn't warrant inclusion in the first place. The WP:RSP list, User:SuperHamster/CiteUnseen and User:Headbomb/unreliable are some of the best tools available to detect bad sources, though remember to use your own judgement as well.
- Copyedit the text and make sure that the text looks more Wikipedia-like. If in doubt, take a look at Wikipedia:Basic copyediting, Wikipedia:Writing better articles, WP:Manual of Style and more.
If you had completed all of these basic techniques, here are some of the more specialized yet powerful ways that you can improve Vital articles. Enjoy these dishes with extra Wikipedia:Ignore all rules and common sense:
- Use the bold, revert, discuss cycle to garner attention and quickly adding improvements the (old) Wikipedia way. This method is especially useful for editing popular country articles provided that you're prepared. Just make an edit that you think it would improve the article, the edit then gets reverted, and both people discuss to reach a better solution.
- Use AutoWikiBrowser and other automated tools to quickly correct errors in many Vital articles. For example, you can use AWB to monitor typos and fix them accordingly. Detailed instructions for some tools such as WP:PetScan and user scripts can be obtained at Wikipedia:WikiProject Vital Articles/Tools.
- Import good content from subtopic articles. For example, in a section about the properties of numbers, it may be helpful to get the content from smaller scope articles such as natural numbers. However, you will need to attribute the source per Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia and can be pretty tedious when messing with the template. An IAR and simpler way might be to make a talk page section and list all of your articles that you've copied, including their oldid.
- And perhaps, the most spicy of 'em all is using large language models such as ChatGPT, GPT-3, etc. for brainstorming ideas on Wikipedia. These neural networks as of 2023 are one of the most powerful tool to face the writer's block and give clues at expanding broad-topic articles, and they have the potential to do far more in the future. It should NOT, however, be used to generate original content because of original research and verifiability policy. For tips on using large language models, see Wikipedia:Using neural network language models on Wikipedia and Wikipedia:Large language models.
Awards
editWe have a good roster of awards given to those that help us advance the goal to make all Vital Articles GAs and FAs. These awards may be awarded by anyone to anyone worthy.
Barnstars
edit{{subst:Vital Barnstar|1=message ~~~~}}
– good old barnstar, given to those that have done a good job.
Vital Barnstar | ||
{{{1}}} |
{{subst:The Vital Articles Barnstar|1=message ~~~~}}
The Vital Articles Barnstar | ||
{{{1}}} |
Userboxes
edit- {{User Vital}} – for members of the project.
This user contributes to Vital Articles on Wikipedia. |
- {{Vital userbox}} – good old userbox, given to those that have done a good job.
This user has received a Vital barnstar. |
- {{Good Vital infobox}} – Userbox for those that have successfully nominated a Vital good article.
This user has helped promote vital good articles on Wikipedia. |
- {{Featured Vital infobox}} – Userbox for those that have successfully nominated a Vital featured article.
This user has helped promote vital featured articles on Wikipedia. |
Assessment
editFor mobile readers, you can click here to switch to desktop mode to read the table more easily. This Vital article assessment scheme is meant to be subjective and complementary to Wikipedia:Content assessment.
Class | Criteria | Reader's experience | Editing suggestions | Example |
---|---|---|---|---|
FA | The article is professional, complete, engaging, and has been vetted by WP:Featured article candidates. More detailed criteria
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Experts and casual readers alike will find the content easy to digest, accurate, and engaging. You can format the article to look like an actual Nature journal article and it would look believable. | Improve the prose, update the information, remove vandalism, make the text more professional and engaging, all the WikiGnome stuff! Try to make the text more readable and engaging to a wider audience if you dare. | Solar System |
A | The article is well organized, complete in terms of content, and has been examined by a dedicated WikiProject department such as WikiProject Military History A-class assessment. As a special assessment rank, it meets the A-Class criteria. The actual criteria can be slightly different due to nuances within individual WikiProjects. | Readers will find it complete, but experts will know better and still have grumbling at missing/incorrect information throughout the article. There will still be hiccups or typos when you read the article top-down. | Expert knowledge may be needed to tweak the article, and style problems may need to be addressed. Consider contacting experts at your relevant A-Class department for more advice. | Napoleon |
GA | The article is reasonably complete and suitable for translation to other languages, after being vetted WP:Good article nominations. More detailed criteria
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Fairly standard quality level for a top-tier Encyclopædia Britannica article but with less generalization and dumb-downness. Readers will at least not be drowned in text, and experts will find it usable for refreshing their memory. | Detect Wikipedia:Systemic bias in the article and address them; more viewpoints generally meant better article at this point. Touch-up on your citations and style and make sure the text is in line with your sources. Make sure that the text is appealing to a wide audience and not a slog to read. | Marie Curie |
B | The article is kinda complete, reliable and suitably organized. From this point on, there is no need to revamp the article layout. More detailed criteria
It meets the six B-Class criteria:
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"Seems good", a reader thought. Citations, prose and images are better than average, but lots of cruds still remain. Experts would likely look elsewhere for content, maybe at a specialist encyclopedia or journal articles if they need answer to specific questions. | A few aspects of content and style need to be addressed. Expert knowledge may be needed. Start addressing systematic bias since this article will be translated to other languages and the inclusion of media should be considered as well. | Atom |
C | The article is still missing important content or contains much irrelevant material. It may still have significant problems or require substantial cleanup. It may have some gaps or missing elements; need editing for clarity, balance, or flow; or contain policy violations, such as bias or original research. | When a reader scrolls down, they would see a vast amount of text no more useful than at a random website, with no coherent theme, and dumpster fire of terrible sources. "This article could be better" – they thought. | Providing references to reliable sources should come first; the article also needs substantial improvement in content and organization. Also improve the grammar, spelling, writing style and improve the jargon use. | Food preservation |
Start | The article sorely lacks content, and lacks a lot of it. The article has a usable amount of good content but is weak in many areas. Quality of the prose may be distinctly unencyclopedic. | Readers find it just a bit more useful than a dictionary definition, and experts will scoff on it. And they would definitely not read more than the lead portion of the article. | Find sources and add content based on them. Make sure that you make the article structure easy to expand upon. Think about a general "theme" or "flow" to the article – what do you want it to look like? | Equation |
Stub | A very basic description of the topic that needs a ton of content expansion. The article will need much work to become a meaningful article. | "Ah yes, that thing exists on Wikipedia" – a reader thought. Then they close Wikipedia and search on Google to hunt down more reliable/comprehensive content. | Add content like there's no tomorrow. Keep doing it. Add more content! | Rapids |
Dashboard
editArticle alerts
editFor article alerts about a specific level, see:
For article alerts on all vital articles (levels 1–5):
Today's featured articles
- 28 Oct 2024 – Cucurbita (talk · edit · hist) will be Today's Featured Article; see blurb
- 27 Oct 2024 – Hadji Ali (talk · edit · hist) will be Today's Featured Article; see blurb
- 26 Oct 2024 – Katy Perry (talk · edit · hist) will be Today's Featured Article; see blurb
Did you know
- 05 Oct 2024 – Matthew Webb (talk · edit · hist) was nominated for DYK by It is a wonderful world (t · c); see discussion
Redirects for discussion
- 16 Oct 2024 – Substituted (talk · edit · hist) →Substitution reaction was RfDed by Mdewman6 (t · c); see discussion
- 15 Oct 2024 – American Mongoloids (talk · edit · hist) →Indigenous peoples of the Americas was RfDed by TeapotsOfDoom (t · c); see discussion
- 15 Oct 2024 – American Mongoloid (talk · edit · hist) →Indigenous peoples of the Americas was RfDed by TeapotsOfDoom (t · c); see discussion
- 15 Oct 2024 – Indyans (talk · edit · hist) →Indigenous peoples of the Americas was RfDed by TeapotsOfDoom (t · c); see discussion
- 15 Oct 2024 – Indian lore (talk · edit · hist) →Indigenous peoples of the Americas was RfDed by TeapotsOfDoom (t · c); see discussion
- 15 Oct 2024 – North American people (talk · edit · hist) →Indigenous peoples of the Americas was RfDed by TeapotsOfDoom (t · c); see discussion
- 11 Oct 2024 – The PlayStationIV (talk · edit · hist) →PlayStation 4 was RfDed by Cogsan (t · c); see discussion
- 11 Oct 2024 – The PlayStation4 (talk · edit · hist) →PlayStation 4 was RfDed by Cogsan (t · c); see discussion
- 11 Oct 2024 – The PlayStation IV (talk · edit · hist) →PlayStation 4 was RfDed by Cogsan (t · c); see discussion
- 11 Oct 2024 – The Play Station IV (talk · edit · hist) →PlayStation 4 was RfDed by Cogsan (t · c); see discussion
- (9 more...)
Files for discussion
- 11 Oct 2024 – File:Deirezzorcivilcouncil.jpg (talk · edit · hist) (on 1, 2) was FfDed by Minorax (t · c); see discussion
- 11 Oct 2024 – File:Manbijcivilcouncil.jpg (talk · edit · hist) (on 1, 2) was FfDed by Minorax (t · c); see discussion
- 11 Oct 2024 – File:Tabqacivilcouncil.jpg (talk · edit · hist) (on 1, 2) was FfDed by Minorax (t · c); see discussion
- 11 Oct 2024 – File:Raqqacivilcouncil.jpg (talk · edit · hist) (on 1, 2) was FfDed by Minorax (t · c); see discussion
Featured article candidates
A-Class review
Good article nominees
- 15 Oct 2024 – Sport climbing (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by Aszx5000 (t · c); start discussion
- 10 Oct 2024 – Vitamin E (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by David notMD (t · c); start discussion
- 08 Oct 2024 – Curry (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by Chiswick Chap (t · c); start discussion
- 08 Oct 2024 – Black Panther (character) (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by Wrangler1981 (t · c); start discussion
- 01 Oct 2024 – Regency of Algiers (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by Nourerrahmane (t · c); start discussion
- 01 Oct 2024 – Connecticut Colony (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by Gazingo (t · c); start discussion
- 26 Sep 2024 – Balto (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by Nathan Obral (t · c); start discussion
- 05 Sep 2024 – Serekunda (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by Vigilantcosmicpenguin (t · c); start discussion
- 14 Aug 2024 – Palaeotherium (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by PrimalMustelid (t · c); see discussion
- 17 Jul 2024 – Sultanate of Bijapur (talk · edit · hist) was GA nominated by Flemmish Nietzsche (t · c); see discussion
- (5 more...)
Featured article reviews
- 29 Sep 2024 – Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough (talk · edit · hist) was put up for FA review by Sawyer777 (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Sep 2024 – Heavy metal (elements) (talk · edit · hist) was put up for FA review by Ldm1954 (t · c); see discussion
- 27 Aug 2024 – The Notorious B.I.G. (talk · edit · hist) was put up for FA review by TechnoSquirrel69 (t · c); see discussion
- 24 Jun 2024 – Middle Ages (talk · edit · hist) was put up for FA review by Borsoka (t · c); see discussion
- 24 May 2024 – Sun (talk · edit · hist) was put up for FA review by 750h+ (t · c); see discussion
- 17 Feb 2024 – Mariah Carey (talk · edit · hist) was put up for FA review by ScarletViolet (t · c); see discussion
Good article reassessments
- 14 Oct 2024 – Steak (talk · edit · hist) was nominated for GA reassessment by Z1720 (t · c); see discussion
- 01 Oct 2024 – Kingston upon Hull (talk · edit · hist) was nominated for GA reassessment by Theleekycauldron (t · c); see discussion
- 02 Sep 2024 – British Airways (talk · edit · hist) was nominated for GA reassessment by Z1720 (t · c); see discussion
- 07 Oct 2024 – United Nations (talk · edit · hist) nominated for GA reassessment by Z1720 (t · c) was closed; see discussion
- 05 Oct 2024 – Brain (talk · edit · hist) nominated for GA reassessment by Z1720 (t · c) was closed; see discussion
- 05 Oct 2024 – Onion (talk · edit · hist) nominated for GA reassessment by Z1720 (t · c) was closed; see discussion
Requests for comments
- 08 Oct 2024 – Bitcoin (talk · edit · hist) has an RfC by Jtbobwaysf (t · c); see discussion
- 24 Sep 2024 – Julian Assange (talk · edit · hist) has an RfC by Jack Upland (t · c); see discussion
- 05 Oct 2024 – Common Era (talk · edit · hist) RfC by Jeaucques Quœure (t · c) was closed; see discussion
Peer reviews
- 24 Aug 2024 – River (talk · edit · hist) has been put up for PR by ForksForks (t · c); see discussion
- 03 Apr 2024 – Campbell's Soup Cans (talk · edit · hist) has been put up for PR by TonyTheTiger (t · c); see discussion
Requested moves
- 16 Oct 2024 – Rudolf Wanderone (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to Minnesota Fats by TenPoundHammer (t · c); see discussion
- 09 Oct 2024 – Deviance (sociology) (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to Deviance by 2804:14C:5BB1:9473:234E:8634:F963:9C71 (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – African Plate (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to African plate by Dicklyon (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – Farallon Plate (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to Farallon plate by Dicklyon (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – Cocos Plate (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to Cocos plate by Dicklyon (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – Somali Plate (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to Somali plate by Dicklyon (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – Juan de Fuca Plate (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to Juan de Fuca plate by Dicklyon (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – South American Plate (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to South American plate by Dicklyon (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – Pacific Plate (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to Pacific plate by Dicklyon (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – Sunda Plate (talk · edit · hist) is requested to be moved to Sunda plate by Dicklyon (t · c); see discussion
- (17 more...)
Articles to be merged
- 15 Oct 2024 – Molecular encapsulation (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Host-guest chemistry by Smokefoot (t · c); see discussion
- 15 Oct 2024 – Inclusion compound (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Host-guest chemistry by Smokefoot (t · c); see discussion
- 08 Oct 2024 – The arts (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Art by Rollinginhisgrave (t · c); see discussion
- 06 Oct 2024 – Theia (planet) (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Giant-impact hypothesis by Hemiauchenia (t · c); see discussion
- 25 Sep 2024 – Splint (medicine) (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Orthotics by Rui Gabriel Correia (t · c); see discussion
- 27 Jul 2024 – Street dog (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Free-ranging dog by Stultiwikia (t · c); see discussion
- 27 Jul 2024 – Free-ranging dog (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Street dog by Stultiwikia (t · c); see discussion
- 18 Jul 2024 – Loss function (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Scoring rule by Closed Limelike Curves (t · c); see discussion
- 13 May 2024 – Rohingya genocide (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Persecution of Muslims in Myanmar by Vanisherman (t · c); see discussion
- 30 Apr 2024 – Legal case (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for merging to Legal proceeding by Visviva (t · c); see discussion
- (4 more...)
Articles to be split
- 11 Oct 2024 – Alcohol (drug) (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by EducatedRedneck (t · c); see discussion
- 05 Oct 2024 – Francoist Spain (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by Salmoonlight (t · c); see discussion
- 03 Aug 2024 – John McCain (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by Vinnylospo (t · c); see discussion
- 13 Jun 2024 – Minority group (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by ChillyDude153198 (t · c); see discussion
- 09 Jun 2024 – Naxalite–Maoist insurgency (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by Vigilantcosmicpenguin (t · c); see discussion
- 09 May 2024 – Michael Crawford (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by 2601:1C1:8200:260:1D7B:1660:F08F:1EAE (t · c); see discussion
- 03 May 2024 – Social choice theory (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by Closed Limelike Curves (t · c); see discussion
- 01 Apr 2024 – Mole salamander (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by TypistMonkey (t · c); see discussion
- 18 Mar 2024 – Gazelle (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by Maykii (t · c); see discussion
- 04 Mar 2024 – Internet celebrity (talk · edit · hist) is proposed for splitting by SilverLocust (t · c); see discussion
- (25 more...)
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Statistics
editVital pages by quality | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Quality | |||||||
Total | |||||||
FA | 735 | ||||||
FL | 10 | ||||||
A | 18 | ||||||
GA | 1,461 | ||||||
B | 7,149 | ||||||
C | 12,810 | ||||||
Start | 11,810 | ||||||
Stub | 836 | ||||||
List | 77 | ||||||
Assessed | 34,906 | ||||||
Total | 34,906 | ||||||
WikiWork factors (?) | ω = 191,872 | Ω = 3.86 |
See also
edit- Wikipedia:WikiProject Vital Articles/Article alerts – specialized noticeboard for Vital articles
- File:Wikipedia’s poor treatment of its most important articles.pdf (2011)
- File:Fun or Functional? The Misalignment Between Content Quality and Popularity in Wikipedia (WMF Research Showcase 2015-09-16).pdf
- Wikipedia:WikiProject Vital Articles/Readability (2016)