Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates

Image/source check requests

FAC mentoring: first-time nominators

A voluntary mentoring scheme, designed to help first-time FAC nominators through the process and to improve their chances of a successful outcome, is now in action. Click here for further details. Experienced FAC editors, with five or more "stars" behind them, are invited to consider adding their names to the list of possible mentors, also found in the link. Brianboulton (talk) 10:17, 30 August 2016 (UTC)

FAC source reviews

For advice on conducting source reviews, see Wikipedia:Guidance on source reviewing at FAC.

Is 2019 RfC still valid? Alt text is not required in FA articles?

I've always thought that alt text was generally required for images in FA articles. But I was recently referred to an RfC from 2019 which concluded that alt text is not a requirement for FA articles. I was unaware of that RfC. It looks like there were 16 participants in that RfC, mostly FA regulars ... and most of them !voted to drop the Alt text requirement. One of the "no" !votes which captures the theme of the RfC is:

"As much as I loved editor Eubulides, who was behind previous FA enforcement of alt text, it was an enormous PITA. Back then, there were gobs of reviewers in a very active FAC process, so we went with it, and it was still too much work. In today's FAC environment, no way. When Eubulides was active, we could count on him to help write the blooming stuff, which was always a challenge. Without him, this is placing an additional burden on a dying process which is already struggling to even address existing standards." [bold emphasis added]

It doesn't appear that any visually impaired editors participated in the RfC. The RfC was conducted in the FA Talk page. Is that RfC still the consensus of the FA community? The RFC's outcome seems wrong to me: there are large numbers of visually impaired people in the world that use screen readers to navigate the internet. And adding Alt text is fast and easy. Noleander (talk) 14:22, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

To me (as I argued at the FAC for Serpent labret with articulated tongue), the FA criteria still include that an FA should meet the whole MoS. MOS:ACCESSIBILITY is MoS. In a recent-ish RFC/discussion here, it was pointed out that it's difficult to point to clear-cut guidance as to what "good" alt text looks like, and that's certainly true. It's also true that the main MoS page doesn't specifically prescribe very much about alt text, other than saying it should generally be used, though it does link to MOS:ALT, which does give some advice -- including, to me most importantly, However, the only situation where blank alt text is acceptable is where such images are unlinked, which is rarely possible. My position is that it's perfectly fine to insist that an FA nomination makes a reasonable effort -- at minimum, providing something which attempts to replicate the visual experience of seeing the image -- even if it's probably not reasonable to be too insistent about what the alt text should look like.

Looking at it from another way -- there's also a lot of latitude at FAC to raise subjective points like "this would read better to me as...", "I think that image would be better placed here", and so on -- in that spirit there seems nothing wrong with saying "I think that alt text would be better if...". I don't think it's our view here that any comment or suggestion is beyond the pale; if an objection becomes the basis of an oppose, it's down to the co-ordinators to assess whether it's founded on a failure to meet the criteria, and therefore whether it should hold up promotion. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 14:29, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

@UndercoverClassicist - You wrote "It's also true that the main MoS page doesn't specifically prescribe alt text ..." but Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Accessibility (the guideline, not the essay) includes: "Images and icons that are not purely decorative should include an alt attribute that acts as a substitute for the image for blind readers, search-spiders, and other non-visual users" [bold emphasis added]. Noleander (talk) 14:38, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

That is true (serves me right for ctrl-f-ing "alt text"!). Amended above. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 14:46, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

The 2019 RfC received a good discussion, with many highly experienced editors (too many no longer with us). A crucial issue was that there was a fatal lack of clarity as to what ALT text should say. At some point an actual visually impaired editor had come along and said that the previous rough consensus on this was all completely wrong, and the prevailing style of ALT text was pretty useless. There was also a long discussion, centred on alternative ALT texts for a photo of King's College Chapel, and others. The ALT text cause at FAC never recovered from these imo. Johnbod (talk) 14:37, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

I'm always happy to include alt text but I would appreciate guidance on whether what I've written is actually useful. Describing an image with text is surprisingly difficult. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 14:49, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

My take on that RFC is "I'm not blind so this is not important to me and I'm not going to bother". Instead, we obsess over the minutiae of reference formatting. I guarantee that in the entire 25 years of Wikipedia, no reader has ever said:

Wikipedia is crap! They used "p" instead of "pp" in a reference. And that hyphen should be an endash. What idiots these people are! If they can't get that stuff right, how can I trust that anything they do is worth reading?

We should require compliance with all of MOS:ACCESS. If we're not very good at writing ALT texts, then we should work on getting better at it, not just throw up our hands and say we're not going to bother.

BTW, I have Image Alt Text Viewer installed. You should do likewise (or as appropriate for your browser). RoySmith (talk) 15:37, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

I'm a software engineer, and I worked on very popular app in the music industry for 20 years. We had many hundreds of thousands of users. Every year we'd get a couple of heartbreaking emails from visually impaired users that were encountering difficulties using our app with screen readers. Music was their one big love in life, their one hobby. They accounted for perhaps 0.01% of our customer base. But when we got a bug report from them, we busted our asses to make sure that our app met their needs. Wikipedia should do no less. Noleander (talk) 18:59, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

Have we figured out yet whether acceptable ALT text is that propounded by

• e.g. the US government (should not contain any extra or unnecessary information, and should not repeat information that is already provided in the text ... Helpful: "Dr. Martin Luther King Jr." Unhelpful: "Black and white photo of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wearing a suit and tie.")
• or e.g. the BBC 150 characters is a good rule of thumb. But this could be more depending on the level of detail needed. (the two US gov examples above are 26 and 75 characters respectively)

? I recall also that there were contradictions between MOS:IMAGES, MOS:ACCESS#Images, and MOS:ALT; have those been resolved? If yes to all of them, then I'd support explicitly adding accessibility to the criteria. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 15:17, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

I'm not sure "different people advise doing it in different ways" is necessarily a huge problem -- after all, look at the multiplicity of approaches to citation style you can find in good sources. That doesn't stop us saying that it's important to cite sources, and indeed we tolerate any method of doing so that fulfils certain very high-level goals (e.g. making sure that it's possible to find the source and verify that it actually contains the information). The same attitude could well be adopted here. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 15:50, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

As I said above, it was essentially the problem that led to ALT text no longer being required. If the purpose of it is to help the visually impaired reader, we need to be confident that it does help them, and we were told that what we were doing did not in fact help. Johnbod (talk) 15:55, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

As Roy says above, I don't think the conclusion there follows from the premise. "We've been doing alt text wrong" is not the same as "we shouldn't bother doing alt text at all", just as "our current citation methods aren't satisfactory" isn't an argument to say "we should stop citing our sources". UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 16:03, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

The issue as I remember it, UndercoverClassicist, was not that there are different approaches, but that the visually impaired editor(s) argued that one approach was harmful and deteriorated the quality of the encyclopedia. As a matter of fact, we do not tolerate any method of citing sources: parenthetical referencing, which fulfils both the citation goals you listed, was formally deprecated in 2020 because it was harmful to readers' experiences. If it is the consensus that any form of alt text is helpful, I would happily support its addition to the criteria. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 17:38, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

the visually impaired editor(s) argued that one approach was harmful and deteriorated the quality of the encyclopedia: I am struggling to find this in the 2019 RFC. I do see SlimVirgin writing The problem when we last tried to require this was that no one knew for sure what editors who use screen readers need. We were encouraged to write long detailed descriptions of the images. The next thing we heard was that people using screen readers had complained about it at Wikimania, so we stopped. It sounds like the issue was with people writing too long alt texts rather than with the existence of them at all -- very much a "we've been doing it wrong" rather than "we shouldn't try to do this at all" UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 18:59, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

As said above, it wasn't in the 2019 RFC but in earlier threads that led up to it. The "conclusion" perhaps was - since we don't know how to do it usefully, let's not make it compulsory. Johnbod (talk) 19:47, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

• Accessibility is an important consideration for any encyclopaedia that seeks to be widely consulted. At present, alt text seems to be the primary means of conveying the content of images to users with visual impairments, as captions alone are often insufficient (e.g., the name of a building or the title and author of a painting rarely provide a meaningful sense of what is depicted). In light of this, the frequently cited view from the 2019 RfC (many contributors are unsure how to write effective alt text and therefore see it as burdensome) is somewhat concerning. If the existing guidance on alt text is unclear, then it ought to be clarified. Once clearer standards are in place, the use of alt text should, in my view, be required. Borsoka (talk) 16:32, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

  I agree that the MOS (and affiliated WP docs) should clearly explain how to write Alt text. The MOS essay Alternative text for images is not bad. At the bottom of that essay are some external links such as this one to Harvard's Digital Accessibility Services which gives concrete examples of Alt text, such as:

  • "Group of young college students laugh and walk along a tree-lined pathway."
  • "Harvard’s Memorial Church with grand columns and hanging banners displaying Harvard shields."

  which show how Alt text should describe the visual content of the image (which is often very different than the image caption). But the MOS should not require editors to visit external sites to get clear guidance. Noleander (talk) 18:53, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

• As per many here, and as per my comments in 2019, I think Alt text should be required except in exceptional circumstances (I can't think of any off the top of my head, but I prefer a degree of flexibility with the MOS). It's already recommended by the MOS (which we are supposed to adhere to). I also agree with the many here who have opined that if the guidelines are a possible barrier to inclusion, these should be clarified. - SchroCat (talk) 16:39, 5 April 2026 (UTC)
• I try to always add alt text, and I certainly add it to articles I nominate when requested by the image reviewer, if I should forget, and I think it's important that it be added for accessibility reasons. However, I have given up making use of the guideline, and simply add whatever text I think might be helpful. I'd much prefer to have a good guideline in place but a couple of attempts to improve it have failed, so now I just ignore it. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 19:56, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

  I left an invitation to join this discussion at WT:WikiProject Accessibility. RoySmith (talk) 20:15, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

• I have always struggled to write alt text, not least because the Wikipedia community and online resources more broadly are not in agreement as to what it should do. This is particularly the case as someone who favors detailed captions, because the distinction between caption and alt text is muddled at best. I fully agree we should be doing our level best to aid visually impaired readers, and I would support mandating the use of text that would be helpful: but the way to do this, as I see it, is to first establish what that looks like, and subsequently mandate it. Vanamonde93 (talk) 20:39, 5 April 2026 (UTC)

  I agree. Although I would support mandating alt text for FAC, we should first focus on clearer guidance for writing it. Toast of Fate ♡ talk to me! 10:58, 6 April 2026 (UTC)

I generally operate under the assumption that ALT text is supposed to substitute the image, thus it has to convey the same information the image has to convey as well. 'course the same image can convey different information depending on the article or even the user. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 09:55, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

I was under the impression that alt text is mandatory for FACs due to the need for FAs to comply with the MOS. And also because some GA reviewers make a note of the comment regarding adding alt text to images. Therefore I'm not against the proposal of requiring alt text for FAs because its long been mandatory for new infrastructure to be accessible. JuniperChill (talk) 22:10, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

Well since the Rfc in 2019, linked at the top here, your impression has essentially been wrong, and plenty of FACs have not included it, nor added it when requested, and still passed. Of course others include it. Johnbod (talk) 22:42, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

what I'm saying is that I always thought its mandatory for images to have alt text in order to pass an FAC. I'm saying this as someone who hasn't promoted an article to FAC, but have nominated/reviewed several for GA (which only mandates a few of the MOS). JuniperChill (talk) 20:23, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

Whether it's a written guideline or not, nothing gets promoted at Featured List if the images don't have alt-text. Bgsu98 (Talk) 20:56, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

ALT text is not required. Take anyone who tries to enforce a rule they made up themselves to ANI for disruptive editing. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:26, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

I’ve never seen someone refuse to do alt-text. That’s why this thread surprised me; I just assumed it was a requirement. Bgsu98 (Talk) 22:33, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

Well, now you know different. I've certainly seen noms politely declining at FAC, and recently, though I'm not going to dig up examples. Johnbod (talk) 00:03, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

Ultimately, people vote with their feet. If 5 people review a FAC and they all say "I refuse to support because there's no ALT text", no amount of protestation from the nominator will get it promoted. RoySmith (talk) 00:19, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

While we're at it - ALT text is not appearing for me. If I hover over an image without it I get the caption, but hovering over one with ALT text gives me nothing. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 01:08, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

• Based on the above discussion, I've made a proposal at MOS:ACCESS to add a sentence to MOS:ACCIM aimed at bringing more clarity to Alt text requirements. Noleander (talk) 23:12, 15 April 2026 (UTC)

Proposal for a revised FAQ page

I've drafted a revised FAQ page for newcomers and first-time nominators.

The aim is to help first-time nominators with common queries and to bring them together in one place. Others are welcome to add further questions or improve the answers.

I had earlier notified Gog the Mild on his talk page. All thoughts are welcome. Thanks. MSincccc (talk) 07:15, 11 April 2026 (UTC)

Thank you for drafting that, MSinc. If you want, I can help with the answers you're not sure about. FrB.TG (talk) 14:30, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

The questions I’m unsure about are listed under Questions I don’t have a proper answer to.

The idea behind posting at WT:FAC was to invite others to suggest further questions, which could be added over time, with a view to the page eventually serving as a useful redirect for first-time nominators at WP:FAC. MSincccc (talk) 09:28, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

@MSincccc that's a good FAQ. I would also add in somewhere that I would encourage first-time nominators to compare their article to an FA on a similar subject and that it's invaluable to get advice from authors of similar articles, whether or not they're able to to formally mentor. And maybe try to engage wikiprojects anyway, even if they don't have an A-class process—you might find someone there with helpful suggestions. For some of your unanswered questions, there isn't a simple answer. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 13:12, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

@MSincccc: I directly edited your draft FAQ page and provided my thoughts on the several "Questions I don’t have a proper answer to." I also did some light copy editing. Of course, feel free to revert if not consistent with your concept. Is the FAQ needed? Maybe. FAC already has the page Template:FAC-instructions which is an FAQ of sorts - but it does not focus on first-time nominators. So perhaps a new FAQ focusing on first-time nominators would be useful. Many essays start in an editor's User space (like you did with this FAQ) and over time they become more mature and useful, and eventually they move into Administrative space (such as the the official FA pages). Noleander (talk) 13:51, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

Thanks @HJ Mitchell and @Noleander.

Please feel free to revise or copy-edit the questions and answers, and to add any further questions I may have missed. MSincccc (talk) 03:51, 14 April 2026 (UTC)

Contemplating skipping GA and going straight to peer review

Hello all, I recently put the article Huhu beetle up for Good Article review with the aim of eventually submitting it for Peer Review and then Featured Article candidate. Unfortunately, it's been nearly two months and it still hasn't been reviewed so I'm contemplating just skipping GA and going straight for peer review. Is it common to skip GA when submitting something for FA? I've notice that most articles seem to go through GA, although I doubt this is a rule per se. AxonsArachnida (talk) 21:55, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

Articles do not have to go through GA before going to FA. Your plan sounds like a good one! Bgsu98 (Talk) 21:57, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

Before you give up on GA, consider using good article review circles ... WP:GARC. Typically, that process will get you a good article review within two or three weeks. But, as the reply above says, GA is not required before nominating for featured article. Noleander (talk) 22:08, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

GAR is perpetually backed up, and I've found the quality of the reviews I get there to be hit or miss, depending on who is doing the review. So skipping GA in favor of going straight to PR seems like a reasonable plan. Don't forget to link into {{FAC peer review sidebar}}. RoySmith (talk) 22:48, 12 April 2026 (UTC)

Unless you are considering a WP:four award, I do not recommend GAN prior to FAC. As Roy says above, GA reviews can be hit or miss and you can be waiting for many months before receiving a review. It is a substantial timesink to go through GAN if you intend to FAC an article. If GARC is quicker, then that may be fine as an alternative – I can't comment on it. Mr rnddude (talk) 01:38, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

The quality of reviews at WP:GARC are lower quality, in my experience, than a typical GA review. On the other hand: even a mediocre review is better than nothing: it is another pair of eyeballs. Another option I've used to hasten GA reviews is to directly contact a potential reviewer on their Talk page and ask. Often they will say "okay". Also: you can contact another editor waiting for a GA review an offer to trade GA reviews. Some editors frown on this quid pro quo technique, but - despite several lengthy discussions in GA Talk pages - quid pro quo is not prohibited. (Pinging AxonsArachnida). Noleander (talk) 02:02, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for everyone's perspectives. I've gone ahead and removed it from GA and switched over to PR instead. AxonsArachnida (talk) 04:48, 13 April 2026 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard § Billboard Philippines - reviews of Philippine music (albums, songs, concerts)

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard § Billboard Philippines - reviews of Philippine music (albums, songs, concerts). Whonting (talk) 04:52, 18 April 2026 (UTC)

This is relevant to Dam (song) and Cherry on Top (Bini song), both currently up at FAC. Whonting (talk) 04:52, 18 April 2026 (UTC)

Reviewers needed

With 56 open nominations currently on the board, the FAC list is looking a bit crowded, and several nominations are stalling simply for lack of eyes. While many of these entries have seen initial movement, they haven't yet reached the consensus threshold required for promotion. To keep the pipeline moving, I’d like to encourage everyone (especially current nominators) to dive in and find a few nominations that pique your interest. Reviewing is the lifeblood of the process; the more we support one another’s work, the more likely you are to attract the critical feedback and support needed for your own nomination to cross the finish line. Happy reviewing! FrB.TG (talk) 23:11, 19 April 2026 (UTC)

I'll try to do a couple tomorrow. A thought: if you identified some specific nominations that are stalling, adding them to FACs needing feedback list may attract reviewers. Noleander (talk) 02:01, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

Echoing this. I haven't done as much reviewing as I'd like recently but it would be good to know if there's anywhere in particular that I should focus my efforts. :) HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 09:11, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

I’ve been trying to review articles regularly, even outside of when I’m nominating any articles, but the amount of FACs is pretty large (to the point where the page barely loads sometimes), so I’ll try to review articles near the bottom over the coming week to help clear the backlog Crystal Drawers 🎖️ ^{(wanna talk?)} 02:38, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

I reviewed two today even though I have not nominated anything, but hopefully to bring a nomination in the near future. I will try do more in the following days. A.Cython(talk) 02:43, 20 April 2026 (UTC)

It seems that the coordinators are increasingly unwilling to archive, or even hint at archiving, nominations which have received some attention but not yet reached full consensus. For instance, History of education in Wales (1870–1939) has only just been requested for withdrawal after being open for six weeks and receiving only one support. Operation Forager logistics and Gott fähret auf mit Jauchzen, BWV 43 have received minimal support and have both not received any comments in the last 20 days, which is surely about when the coords should be making a note on the nomination? Maybe as a result of this comment they'll receive a bit more attention which well help them limp across the line, but at the expense of other nominations! More proactiveness is needed from the coordinators, in addition to the reviewers, I think. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 11:59, 22 April 2026 (UTC)

Reviewers must have read this, because BWV 43 has now three supports. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:11, 24 April 2026 (UTC)

I've not been active lately owing to a serious illness in the family. Hopefully back on next week. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:35, 23 April 2026 (UTC)

Perhaps we should look into getting an additional coordinator or two It seems unfair to put this workload on so few. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 05:38, 23 April 2026 (UTC)

Thanks Generalissima, that is a constructive suggestion. However, I am unsure that that is really where the problem is. Imagine some nirvana where every editor who nominated at FAC did 7 or 8 reviews - the number they "consume", on average - for each of their noms. The issue would rapidly disappear, and the coordinators would probably have less work than they do now. Gog the Mild (talk) 19:57, 24 April 2026 (UTC)

It would be helpful to know what each of the older nominations is missing, but that might be an unreasonable amount of work for three humans who presumably sleep at some point. For example, I look at some and think they seem to be progressing nicely or the nominator is actively working through comments and it's hard to tell which ones are most ripe for fresh eyes. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:44, 24 April 2026 (UTC)

I don't think it's fair to blame the coords for reticence to archive. As reviewers, we're equally loathe to oppose. Part of it is probably sunk costs of reviewer and nominator effort once a nomination has attracted some support, part of it might just be that we all want nominations to succeed. And of course many reviewers are also nominators, so we know how frustrating it is not to get the feedback we need. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:50, 24 April 2026 (UTC)

For me, a big part of it is I don't want to deal with the fallout. Some nominators don't take kindly to having their nominations opposed and I'm not really up for that most of the time. RoySmith (talk) 21:08, 24 April 2026 (UTC)

Which, again, is something the coordinators should be proactive in looking at. If people are scared to oppose because of disgruntled nominators, that diminishes the worth of every FAC nomination. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 22:55, 24 April 2026 (UTC)

I'd put it in a slightly different way, but I do think reviewers -- I'm certainly including myself here -- are more likely to review articles they think have a reasonable chance of passing. Conversely, the fact that an article isn't getting reviews may be a sign that people are skimming over it and deciding that they're unlikely to get to a support, even if the issues aren't bad enough to come out and write an oppose review. I don't think it's about being "scared" to oppose, and more that (as Harry says above) nobody wants to trash another editor's hard work; equally, negative reviews of improvable articles can be quite a lot of work, since you find a lot of problems, the nominator works on them, you then have to feed back on the improvements, and maybe it's good enough to support after that. Some of the time, I think the co-ordinators would be justified in taking a lack of supporting reviews as a collective judgement in itself. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 05:45, 25 April 2026 (UTC)

A question

A few months ago, I nominated Exile (American band) for FAC, but despite no major objections to quality, the discussion didn't get much activity and quietly fizzled out with the article not getting promoted. What do you recommend for getting more engagement at an FAC? Ten Pound Hammer (they/them) • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 15:25, 27 April 2026 (UTC)

• @TenPoundHammer: Reviewing other articles at FAC: this clears the backlog, making it more likely that your article will get noticed by interested reviewers, and builds goodwill amongst FAC reviewers. I try to maintain a 5.0 review-to-FAC ratio, and use this toolforge to check my stats. Z1720 (talk) 16:31, 27 April 2026 (UTC)

+1 to what Z1720 said. You can also notify relevant WikiProjects. Vacant0 (talk • contribs) 16:45, 27 April 2026 (UTC)

Exactly the reason why users who have nominated an article for GA should consider reviewing other articles for GA. I currently have 14 GAN reviews and brought 4 articles to GA; and have reviewed a couple FACs even though I never brought an article to FAC myself JuniperChill (talk) 19:23, 1 May 2026 (UTC)

Sanity check

Hello all, I very vaguely remember seeing a tool somewhere that tracks the amount of support/oppose of all current nominations. For the life of me I can't find it anywhere and am beginning to question if I'm misremembering this. Am I losing my mind? AxonsArachnida (talk) 23:16, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

Do you mean this one? Note that it takes some time to be updated. A.Cython(talk) 23:50, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

That must be it. Thanks. AxonsArachnida (talk) 23:57, 28 April 2026 (UTC)

FAC reviewing statistics and nominator reviewing table for March 2026

Here are the FAC reviewing statistics for March 2026; thanks to FrB.TG for doing the analysis on these. These are a month late; the delay is my fault, not theirs -- FrB.TG did their part quickly, but I've been too busy to do the final processing step for the last two or three weeks. The tables below include all reviews for FACS that were either archived or promoted last month, so the reviews included are spread over the last two or three months. A review posted last month is not included if the FAC was still open at the end of the month. The new facstats tool has been updated with this data, but the old facstats tool has not. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:44, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

The following table shows the 12-month review-to-nominations ratio for everyone who nominated an article that was promoted or archived in the last three months who has nominated more than one article in the last 12 months. The average promoted FAC receives between 7 and 8 reviews. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:44, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

-- Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:44, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

Introducing people

In some of my earliest FACs, reviewers told me I had to introduce people. So instead of "Fred Foobar said these widgets are good", I had to write "Widget expert Fred Foobar said these widgets are good". I started doing that, and eventually it became automatic. And now I find that I'm dinging other authors about it when I review their articles. Which begs the question, why must we do that? Surely if somebody is passing judgement on widget quality, the reader can figure out that they know something about widgets?

To take an example from my current FAC, "In their 1977 book, Learning from Las Vegas: The Forgotten Symbolism of Architectural Form, architects Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown said ...". What have I really acomplished by telling the reader that these two people who wrote a book about architecture, are indeed, architects?

A bit later on, I've got "In her treatment of religious architecture in the United States, Monumental Jesus, humanities professor Margaret Grubiak examined ..." where I think it makes more sense to let the reader know that this person writing about architecture is not, in fact, an architect as they might otherwise asssume, and thus approaching the subject from a different point of view. But is there really any value to these introductions when it's obvious from context? RoySmith (talk) 16:28, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

Speaking as a reader, I find it helpful to see a persons occupation/backround when they are first mentioned. Not only for the obvious reason (identifying their expertise) but also because the name alone (without occupation) makes me wonder: Am I supposed to know who that person is? Are they famous? Were they mentioned earlier and I missed it? Anything we can do to make things clear for readers is good. On a related note, see MOS:PSEUDOTITLE. Noleander (talk) 16:40, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

I agree with Noleander. Another consideration: "Is it important that the reader knows who this person is and they need to be introduced in the prose text?" A reader doesn't need a quote from every source in the reception section, and quotes saying similar things can be merged and attributed to multiple sources with inline citations. Most interested readers know that the inline citation will state who the author is. Z1720 (talk) 16:57, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

If all we intend to say is "X says in book Y" introducing "the writer" would be unnecessary lest the person X has another title or wrote the same in a specific capacity.

Similarly it would be unnecessary to say "Song S was sung by the singer Z" but it's useful in another instance where people from various backgrounds are mentioned together. For instance, a sentence from my article Earthshot Prize:

The thirteen members are Prince William, Queen Rania of Jordan, the actress Cate Blanchett, Ernest Gibson, the environmental activist Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, the business executive Indra Nooyi, the climate activist Luisa Neubauer, the former astronaut Naoko Yamazaki, the economist Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the fashion designer Stella McCartney, the chef and restaurateur José Andrés, the environmentalist Wanjira Mathai, the indigenous activist Nemonte Nenquimo, and the supermodel Gisele Bündchen who select the winners in a judging session led by Christiana Figueres.

In this case, describing each person briefly helps the reader.

That's from me.

Best, MSincccc (talk) 17:47, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

In some -- perhaps niche -- cases, there are reasons to avoid these introductions. See the FAC on Beulé Gate back in 2024, in particular the comments from RoySmith and Choliamb, as to why this can be difficult in classical archaeology circles -- I'll quote a few here:

• You have "the archaeologist Paul Graindor", "the archaeologist Wilhelm Dörpfeld", "the architectural historian William Bell Dinsmoor", etc ... I get the style of introducing people with what they do, but this is an archeology article so the reader can reasonably assume anybody not explicitly introduced is probably an archeologist (Roy)
• the differences between "archaeologist" and "art historian" and "architectural historian" and "ancient historian" and "classicist" are not differences that a general audience is likely to understand or care about. Obviously it's a different matter if you're reporting the opinion of someone from outside the field ... But in the great majority of cases, where it can be assumed that the scholars you are citing work in a field directly related to the content for which you are citing them, such labels just seem like unnecessary clutter. (Choliamb)
• Worse still, by doing this, you run the risk of mischaracterizing the scholars in question ... (Choliamb) -- what follows is, in part, an illustration of why terms like art historian/archaeologist/epigrapher/classicist/Hellenist etc can often refer equally well to the same person, and confuse either non-specialists who assume there's a large difference or specialists who will be more alert than they should to these subtle but perhaps unwarranted distinctions. This also came up with Aineta aryballos, where you have people like Yannis Galanakis, who was writing a work of archaeological history but has a couple of different academic specialisms: you can either call him an "archaeologist", and wrongly imply that he's outside his skillset, or call him an "archaeological historian", and confuse just about everyone who's actually met him or read his work, probably including the man himself.

Another source of wisdom to which I often refer is Context considered harmful by Caeciliusinhorto, which gives several circumstances in which brief introductions are helpful and quite a few in which they are far from it. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 19:14, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

Nice to see myself quoted :-) What got me going on this was this recent edit of mine where I declared war on "architectural historian". In this case, I found a good way to eliminate the redundancy, but it doesn't always work so cleanly. RoySmith (talk) 19:27, 5 May 2026 (UTC)

I hadn't seen User:Caeciliusinhorto/Context considered harmful, but it expresses what I have long thought, and then some more. Very good. Writing mostly on art, I don't say "art historian", as that is expected, but if it is something unexpected I'll say that. Another reason to avoid introductions is that they very often involve false title phrasing, which most British English readers find grating. Johnbod (talk) 02:52, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

If we're introducing someone by the book they wrote (assuming the book's title gives an idea of its content), we probably don't need to state their expertise. Otherwise I think it's generally helpful to do so unless it's obvious or breaks up the flow of the prose. Many articles cover several disciplines and a historian will have a different perspective to an art critic or an engineer or an archaeologist, for example. I would also argue that it's part of "placing the subject in context" as required by 1b. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 12:13, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

It also occurs to me that if we've already linked to our own article about the person, that may stand in for the introduction, especially when there's already some other contextual clues like "in their book on this subject ...". If the reader is still wondering "who is this person and why should I care what they say?", the answer is a click away. RoySmith (talk) 12:41, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

Sorry, Roy, but I disagree with that. We shouldn't expect readers to click the link for vital context; consider reusers or offline readers. The best way I've seen it put is "write as though the reader is reading a printed copy of the article". HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 13:12, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

I agree with Mitchell. We should write as if the reader knows nothing on the subject to minimize the need to jump to another page.A.Cython(talk) 13:44, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

Agree with Mitchell: we need to err on the side of helping readers. The essay User:Caeciliusinhorto/Context considered harmful is elegant and the author is clearly an intelligent individual. However, the essay is only applicable to articles on very narrow, abstruse topics where the only sources are academics in a particular field. The essay opines: "Explaining that the viewpoint is that of a "historian" or "biologist" or whatever doesn't tell readers anything they couldn't already work out." [bold emphasis added]. Editors should not assume that readers share the same expertise. That essay should not be used as guidance for most articles. Noleander (talk) 14:44, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

I'll quote myself from Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/George Griffith/archive1: I typically provide a gloss when writing articles like this, but only when I can come up with a comparatively brief one that gives the reader useful context. Thus, Sam Moskowitz is described as "Griffith's biographer" when contrasting his view against that of a Wells scholar and E. F. Bleiler is noted as writing "in the 1990 reference work Science-Fiction: The Early Years", but I settled for merely linking e.g. Darko Suvin, and since John McNabb does not at present have a Wikipedia article and I don't think it would be possible to explain why his viewpoint is relevant (for the record, in his own words he "stud[ies] the history of Palaeolithic archaeology through the lens of Victorian and Edwardian science fiction – the so called scientific romances") without going into way too much detail for an inline gloss I decided the reference itself would suffice. The reader should be able to assume that the attributed opinions are relevant or else they would presumably not be included in the first place, after all. Simply describing everyone as an "academic" (or similar) doesn't strike me as particularly helpful to the reader. TompaDompa (talk) 19:37, 7 May 2026 (UTC)

Sourcing question

Hi all, I've encountered a situation I haven't seen before and I'm looking for a bit of advice pre-FAC: what's the best way to cite a source that was published in two different places, like a journal article published on the author's website? Can I cite the journal and link to the web version, or put an "also published at..." note next to the reference in the bibliography? HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 17:02, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

The priority should be to make sure the thing you actually read is included. Past that, I would cite the more academic one in the bibliography, and then either include the more accessible website one (presumably a reprint) after the citation, or in the actual footnote (I did the latter with Wellesz 1957 at the Oxford History of Music, for instance).

In theory, you could include either without the other (as long as the one you're including is the one you read), since the website is from a subject-matter expert. But in practice, I would say the above scheme is most thorough. Aza24 (talk) 17:25, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

Thanks. The two versions are word-for-word identical (I've read both). I think your suggestion might be the way to go but I'm happy to hear any other suggestions as well. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 17:34, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

I've encountered that situation several times. I always cite the exact source I read, then add a supplemental note at the end (outside the Template:Cite braces) that gives the reader a link to another location that may be easier for them to find. Example:

* Fell, Robin; et al. (2014). Geotechnical Engineering of Dams (Second ed.). Taylor & Francis. ISBN 9781138000087. Retrieved 20 April 2026. First edition (2005) online in Internet Archive.

In this example, the two versions are not word-for-word identical, but the pattern would also work in that case. Noleander (talk) 17:54, 6 May 2026 (UTC)

You'd also want to check that the republication is permitted (which may not be the case even if it's posted by the author). Nikkimaria (talk) 03:12, 7 May 2026 (UTC)

The way I do this is to use the journal (or book etc) article for the link and put something in the via= parameter if I accessed it via ResearchGate and Academia.edu or something among these lines. That mentions the page one actually used and addresses concerns about LINKVIO, concerns about the URLs not being stable, and punts some of the work to the bots. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 06:40, 7 May 2026 (UTC)

How do I list an article for FAC?

Can someone help me on how to list the River Ivel? The River Ivel has:

• good-quality sources such as Historic England, Uk Government, etc
• several images
• complete infobox
• Several § including, ecology,geology,hydrology,history,tributaries, course.

Should it be suitable for Featured Article Candidate or the Good Article Nomination? TheAnomynousEditor (talk) 19:37, 9 May 2026 (UTC)

Probably wisest to put it through WP:Good Article before FA. For more guidance, see FAQs for first-time FA nominators. Detailed instructions for nominating at FAC are at the top of the FAC page. Noleander (talk) 19:43, 9 May 2026 (UTC)

Thank you 👍 TheAnomynousEditor (talk) 19:55, 9 May 2026 (UTC)

And most importantly, do some reviewing at FAC to get a handle on the process. Johnbod (talk) 22:23, 9 May 2026 (UTC)

Same with GAN, seeing as GAN is approaching 1000 nominations JuniperChill (talk) 22:44, 9 May 2026 (UTC)

For FAC or GAN, are secondary sources acceptable if the River Ivel gets good article or featured article? TheAnomynousEditor (talk) 06:20, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

The sourcing requirements for FAC are given at WP:HQRS; those at GAN need to meet the lower standard of WP:RS. What do you mean by "secondary sources"? We define it to mean books, articles, and so on that analyse and construct narratives out of primary sources, such as scientific data, historical documents, and geographical information. The vast majority of citations in most good Wikipedia articles should be to secondary sources, but primary sources can sometimes be used with proper care (see WP:PRIMARY for details). UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 07:49, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

I mean secondary sources like: books and websites. TheAnomynousEditor (talk) 08:42, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

I'd suggest giving the pages I linked above a read: they'll tell you what you need to know about choosing and evaluating sources. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 09:18, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

FAC reviewing statistics and nominator reviewing table for April 2026

Here are the FAC reviewing statistics for April 2026. The tables below include all reviews for FACS that were either archived or promoted last month, so the reviews included are spread over the last two or three months. A review posted last month is not included if the FAC was still open at the end of the month. The new facstats tool has been updated with this data, but the old facstats tool has not. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:46, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

The following table shows the 12-month review-to-nominations ratio for everyone who nominated an article that was promoted or archived in the last three months who has nominated more than one article in the last 12 months. The average promoted FAC receives between 7 and 8 reviews. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:46, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

-- Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 12:46, 10 May 2026 (UTC)

And a note: I've been cleaning up the code that generates this data, and found a bug that meant a few reviews never went into the database. The affected editors are FunkMonk, SchroCat, TechnoSquirrel69, Gonzo fan2007, Gog the Mild, AirshipJungleman29, RoySmith, Crystal Drawers, and LittleLazyLass. The reviews were from the last two years. Each of those editors will have one more review to their credit the next time they happen to look at their stats. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:52, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

Automated verification of sources

We've built a tool for automated verification of online sources - whether they support the claims they are attached to or not.

@Johnjbarton has used it for FAR and and found that it "made a huge improvement over manually verifying citations". Other editors have used it for GAR.

Recently I checked a few articles awaiting peer review and found a few discrepancies. The tool has a number of limitations due to using LLMs and issues with fetching website contents. For each flagged citation the user has to decide what the proper course of action is after checking the source (adding a tag, fixing an error immediately, removing unsourced content, etc.).

Hopefully it can be useful for FA review. If you try using it, I would be grateful for any feedback. Alaexis_¿question? 13:50, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

How does this differ from User:Anne drew/Veracity? RoySmith (talk) 13:53, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

I believe that this tool is supposed to analyse sources by itself, whereas Veracity leaves the actual analysis to you. I say "I believe" because it hasn't really worked for any of the articles I looked at, but it seems like that's a me problem. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 14:00, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

I just tried it again on Robin Nievera, which I'm reviewing for GA, as that's all online sources. It's better than before, but still numerous errors, e.g. it falsely says this source doesn't support the sentence "Nievera had recently signed with Viva Artists Agency, which he said "helped with rehearsals" for the show.". Considering the number of false negatives, I'm not sure I'd trust that all the positives are true either. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 14:10, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for testing it. This error is due to problems with fetching data from the website. The model only got Internet Archive metadata and didn't understand that it got partial data. Alaexis_¿question? 15:24, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

@AirshipJungleman29, one more question, when you review a GA/FA candidate, do you manually check every citation? Alaexis_¿question? 15:33, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

No, I spot-check a percentage of sources, but in recent reviews I've begun using the Veracity script to semi-automate it. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 15:35, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

In that case I think that this tool can complement what you're doing. To take Robin Nievera as an example, citation [15] might not end up in the subset you're checking manually. It was flagged as "Not Supported" in the report I've just run and it seems like indeed there is an error: the article says Nievera composed the entire album while the source says So, not all the songs are written just by me, you know. There was a lot of help from different kinds of people. To find it, I only had to check 4 citations flagged as "Not Supported" (see the report here). Alaexis_¿question? 15:55, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

I believe the two tools are very similar: they both build a table of all (or selected) cites of an article. The "AI Source Verification" tool (from user:Alaexis) also makes a query to an external AI tool to ask "Does this cite support the body text?", and includes that result in the table. The Veracity tool from user:Anne drew does not make any judgements about whether the cite supports the text (i.e. the table is a framework for an editor to use for manual validation).

I've used both tools: The are both outstanding. On my articles, the "AI Source Verification" tool could not produce many useful "valid?" results because 90% of the sources were "unavailable". Also, I don't trust the results of the AI invoked by the "AI Source Verification" tool ... the judgements it was making appeared to be based on very shaky reasoning. (Also: there were a couple of "Failed verification"s that were erroneous because the source was only partially available to the AI). Maybe in a few years it will be more useful. YMMV.

The Veracity tool is handy for FA source reviews because it will randomly select a handful cites for the reviewer (thus avoiding any subconscious bias if the reviewer were to manually select the cites). Again: both tools are great, and kudos to the editors for taking the time to build them. Noleander (talk) 14:01, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

I'm also optimistic about these tools. I've only used Veracity so far, but I do plan on trying this one soon. Like most automated tools, they're not perfect, but their imperfection does not mean they're not useful and like everything related to LLMs, they will only get better as time goes on. RoySmith (talk) 14:17, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

Absolutely - lmk what you think once you try it! Alaexis_¿question? 15:35, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

@Noleander - can you share a few examples of "shaky reasoning"? We're now testing different models and it would be great to see how they fare. As to 90% "unavailable" was it because they were offline? Alaexis_¿question? 15:31, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

It would be useful if there was a way to make "unavailable" sources available to these tools. Many "unavailable" sources actually exist in machine-readable form, just not exposed to the public. I expect I'm typical of most editors in that I've got my own collection of documents stashed away on my local storage of things behind paywalls, scans I got from research services, etc. It would be great if I could tell these tools how to access those. Even better, it would be awesome if there was a standardized way to do that which all the tool-writers could take advantage of. RoySmith (talk) 15:44, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

I've been thinking about it too. Unfortunately it's not that easy to integrate with the Wikipedia Library, which would've solved a lot of problems. For now the only option the tool offers when a source is not available is copypasting its text manually. Alaexis_¿question? 15:56, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

The fact that it's not easy is why it would be so useful to carve that out as a pluggable component. Somebody who knows the ins and out of navigating TWL can solve that problem once and then all the LLM tool writers can take advantage of it. RoySmith (talk) 16:11, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

I agree, but the challenges are not only technical, see this discussion. Alaexis_¿question? 17:40, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

Sigh. Yeah, that's a valid problem. TWL is an awesome amenity which depends on carefully negotiated vendor agreements so I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt on this. RoySmith (talk) 14:02, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

@Alaexis I don't have time to to do that research today. But you can run the tool on the articles where I saw the issues (Bridge and/or Nile). Noleander (talk) 16:05, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

@Alaexis for FAs, I've always manually spot checked every single source cited, if I can readily access it. because of false positives come or false negatives, I don't know if I would be changing that soon. But this tool could be very helpful.----3family6 (Talk to me|See what I have done) 16:43, 11 May 2026 (UTC)

Admiral Robert Blake

I nominate this article for featured. It is well written very interesting and a story far too few have heard. Merasmous (talk) 10:11, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

@Merasmous - Detailed instructions for nominating an article for FA status are posted at the top of the FAC page. For more guidance, see FAQs for first-time FA nominators. Noleander (talk) 14:01, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

@Merasmous (courtesy link Robert Blake (admiral)) I would note that the presence of citation needed tags is enough to not only fail FAC, but WP:GAN too (as the article isn't even a good article to begin with.) I notice that you're a new editor, so you may wish to consider improving existing articles for a couple weeks before getting one to GAN as getting an article to FA is one of the hardest tasks on Wikipedia and only about 1 in 1000 articles are an FA. I've never brought an article to FA myself (after editing for a couple years having 6,5k edits), although I did brought up several to GA. JuniperChill (talk) 14:13, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

I also see that you have never edited Robert Blake (admiral), which more or less makes you ineligible to nominate it, certainly not without first discussing it with the major editors of the article, which in this case means @Gwillhickers. RoySmith (talk) 14:55, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

• Merasmous, first of all let me say, Welcome to Wikipedia. Yes, I'm afraid that JuniperChill and RoySmith are correct. i.e. With citation needed tags, even one, the article would not pass a GA, let alone a FA nomination. I've not made any edits to this article in more than two and a half years, so I'd have to peruse through it to see if had a snowball's chance. However, since there are only two citation tags at the end of the article, I would assume it wouldn't take much effort to remedy that situation. Other things to consider is the integrity of existing citations and their respective sources. Things like good narrative flow, any tangential or otherwise lengthy prose are also factors. I'd recommend fixing the cite tags in question, go over the article and then decide whether to nominate it for a GA, first. In the event that a GA nomination passes review, chances for a FA are much better. If you have any questions you'll find most editors are always happy to help. Cheers !! -- Gwillhickers (talk) 15:46, 12 May 2026 (UTC)
• Made a few corrections i.e.Samuel was not killed in a "duel" but in a brawl with a Royalist officer and his men. Also, Robert emigrated to Carolina in 1683, not in 1682, per Hannay, 1896. Added appropriate citations and an extra source. Hope this gets you started. Good luck. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 17:02, 12 May 2026 (UTC)

Art infobox date

At Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Campbell's Soup Cans/archive4 we are having a bit of trouble determining what date should be in the infobox for a work created from November 1961-June 1962 and debuted in July 1962. I.e., should it be 1961–62 or 1962. Surely there is a preferred way. Could someone stop by and explain it to us.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 18:02, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

I usually go with completion or unveiling date, but if it's too nuanced consider just leaving it out of the infobox. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:26, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

FAC Plans for River Ivel

I might put the River Ivel article for FAC, are there any weaknesses on the article and is GA the better option? How do i list an article for fac? TheAnomynousEditor (talk) 18:26, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

For a first-time nominator, the general advice is to do GA first, and then post it at WP:PR, linking it into {{FAC peer review sidebar}}. GA is pretty backed up these days, but if you can put up with the waiting, it's still worth doing. I would also look for similar articles that are already FA (see WP:FA#Bodies of water and water formations to see what other people have done and perhaps ping some of the authors to ask that they look at your article. RoySmith (talk) 18:35, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

@RoySmithDo you mean the people who created the article or pushed it to FA? TheAnomynousEditor (talk) 18:45, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Those are usually (but not always) the same people. But in the cases where they're not, the people who shepherded the article through FAC would probably have the best insights to share. If I could toot my own horn for a moment, you might also like Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2024-01-10/In focus. RoySmith (talk) 20:06, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Hi @TheAnomynousEditor, welcome to FAC! Unfortunately, as it stands, the article River Ivel stands no chance of passing the featured article process. Featured articles need to be professional quality and summarise everything that is known about the subject, which requires consulting all the potential source material. The only English river featured article we have at present is the River Parrett but you could look at that article and compare it to the article on the Ivel to see how you could expand that article. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:36, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

@TheAnomynousEditor - For some introductory guidance aimed at first-time FAC nominators, see the Frequently Asked Questions at WP:FACFAQ. Noleander (talk) 21:18, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Hi TheAnomynousEditor. I'm sorry to disappoint you, but getting an article straight FAC is pretty much the hardest task in Wikipedia, even more so when the article is not a GA. To put it into perspective, only 1 in every c. 1000 articles is an FA. And most FACs are nominated when the article is a GA. However, the article at the current stage might pass GA, as there are GAs that are only 500 words long but pretty much every FA is at least 1000 words long. Note that not all notable articles can be improved to FA or even GA if there not a lot of reliable sources that talk about the subject, especially when the article has just enough reliable sources to pass notability (often three or in some cases two) JuniperChill (talk) 21:19, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

I mean no offense, but the article in its current state would have difficulty passing GA. Bgsu98 (Talk) 21:49, 27 May 2026 (UTC)

Questions about niche FACs from prospective first-time nominator

I mainly edit articles related to contemporary/recent politics, and I have a few articles that I've been tempted to bring to FAC. However, most of the topics I write about tend to be pretty niche and often reliant on contemporaneous primary sources due to a paucity of high-quality academic sources. Out of the articles I have worked on that I think could go to FAC, 2010 Iowa judicial retention elections has been peer-reviewed and has a decent amount of secondary sources, SA Best recently received GA status but is largely reliant on primary sources, and 2026 Nepean state by-election is almost entirely reliant on primary sources, and currently a candidate for copy-editing.

I guess I write here to ask what the point of seeking an FAC is, for lack of a better word. A lot of what motivates me to edit is strengthening the historical record and keeping Wikipedia reliable and neutral, and these articles concern relatively unimportant topics with a niche audience. There certainly is room to improve them, they're not perfect, but I also don't think there's any particular reason they need to be FAs, aside from the cool icon, and I tend to suspect the energy expended by other editors on an FAC would not be worth it, as these are not terribly important topics. I am proud of all of these and the research I have put into them (and especially the 2026 Nepean one, where my own photos illustrate much of the article -- though it would be a good bit before I brought that one to FAC in any case), and I am tempted to bring any one of them to FAC, but I suppose I am unsure if it will actually be a rewarding experience or a significantly helpful one, both for the article itself and the broader project. My fear is that my time would be best improving another article than getting one of these three from 80% quality to 95% quality. So I write here to ask people who have gotten an article to FA status that is relatively minor/niche what they have considered the most rewarding part of the experience, and if they would recommend it to me. Best, and appreciate the help! --LivelyRatification (talk) 05:12, 7 June 2026 (UTC)

This is kind of the opposite of what you're asking for, but I only nominate an article for FAC if I feel like I understand the topic thoroughly myself. In my field, to understand a topic that well virtually requires reading book-length studies of it, which I can't do if nobody has written those studies in the first place. If there's a topic that hasn't been studied that extensively, but for which the extant sources do cover the basics, there's nothing wrong with bringing that topic to GA level and leaving it there. A. Parrot (talk) 06:14, 7 June 2026 (UTC)

There is nothing in WP:FACR which flat-out forbids the use of primary sources. Additional guidance can be found at WP:HQRS. Ultimately, most of the FA requirements are a bit squishy and their interpretation largely depends on who happens to show up for any particular review. I suggest you look for previous FAs on similar topics (i.e. WP:FA#Politics and government) and see what kind of sourcing they had. Also read their FAC nominations and see what reviewers had to say about the sources. Concentrate on the newest ones since things change over time. You might want to ping specific nominators or reviewers from those FACs to get more focused opinions. RoySmith (talk) 12:36, 7 June 2026 (UTC)

Thanks! I have done that, and specifically I've looked at 2016 Sleaford and North Hykeham by-election and Referendum Party, the former of which is probably my most helpful analogue as it relies on a good deal of primary sources. If I do bring any article to FAC I will certainly consider reaching out to nominators or reviewers from relevant FACs, that's very helpful advice. LivelyRatification (talk) 13:34, 7 June 2026 (UTC)

FYI: There was an FA nomination last year that was not promoted ... I vaguely recall that heavy reliance on primary sources was one of the issues raised. The nominator re-nominated it and it was promoted in the second attempt. Noleander (talk) 17:08, 7 June 2026 (UTC)

If your goal is to improve the encyclopedia as a whole – and indirectly help humanity – then the most efficient use of your time is probably bringing articles to GA status. FAC can be very time consuming: you could get multiple articles to GA status in the same time as a single FA.

FAC is a good option if there was a subject you were particularly passionate about, and you wanted to share it with the world via Today's Featured Article on the Wikipedia Main Page. Above you write that your desire is ".. strengthening the historical record and keeping Wikipedia reliable and neutral..." so perhaps GA is sufficient for your purposes?

Regarding articles on recent events that rely on news articles and primary sources, as RoySmith says above, they are permitted for FAC, but it may (or may not) cause the FA process to take a tiny bit longer (if you have to spend time explaining lack of 2ndary sources to reviewers). Noleander (talk) 12:53, 7 June 2026 (UTC)

Backlog and underlying issue

Somewhat surprised to see that the backlog stands at 65 nominations, which must be close to an all-time record. Two coordinators (Gog the Mild and Ian Rose) have not promoted/archived anything in a month, David Fuchs has not done so in two weeks, which has left FrB.TG as the sole active coordinator (although they too have not made any edits in the past week). I note a near-complete absence of the usual system of coordinator nudges/warnings/welcomes etc, which must have an effect too. This issue has become acute over the last year; further dysfunction could see the process slip into the sort of awe-inspiring breakdown currently besetting the GA nomination process, where new participants will look at the current state and think this is how the process is supposed to function.

I suggest, with very grateful thanks to the current coordinators for all they have done, that we look at adding or replacing coordinators to stop such a slide at FAC. Thoughts? ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 10:54, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

I don't think the problem is quite as dire as Airship describes (I only count 48 noms, not 65) but I do agree with the general sentiment that we seem to be getting down to a dangerously low bus number. RoySmith (talk) 11:17, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

My bad, I can't count these days. ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 11:23, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

Is there a way that we as participants can currently help out? Vacant0 (talk • contribs) 11:59, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

Review more, I suppose? ~~ AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 13:57, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

I've noticed several older FACs that by now should have received the patented Gog the Mild "Unless it shows significant signs of moving towards a consensus to promote over the next three or four days I am afraid that it is going to time out"™ statement. I suppose I can drop that on some of the backlogged articles as long as I clarify that I am not a coordinator. Bgsu98 (Talk) 14:05, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

While going through the old nominations, I see several that, by my count, have received at least three support votes (with full reviews), plus the source and image reviews. About 6–8 could likely be promoted to clear out the backlog. Bgsu98 (Talk) 14:36, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

• I have essentially not edited for the past six weeks due to ill health. That seems to be improving a little, so I shall see if I can get back into the routine. My lawyers shall be calling on Bgsu98 regarding the patents on my boilerplate. Gog the Mild (talk) 14:57, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

  I hope you are feeling better! I also hope you know how much your work on WP is appreciated by many people. 😃 Bgsu98 (Talk) 15:00, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

  Get well soon, Gog the Mild, and no need to rush into editing until you have fully recovered. Happy to cover for you until then. FrB.TG (talk) 16:01, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

• I think when the role was created, FAC co-ords assessed consensus for a nomination. Nowadays, FAC co-ords are also the nom's last-reviewer, reading through the article to ensure it adheres to the FA criteria. The co-ords (both past and current) are fantastic with this additional responsibility, but last-reviewer responsibilities take more time to promote a nomination. I think more FAC co-ords will help spread out the work and allow the co-ords to take breaks when they need to, as several other experienced editors will (hopefully) pick up the work. If needed, we can also have a couple head-FAC co-ordinators, responsible for answering queries (like second nomination requests, or closing the most contentious FACs). Thoughts on expanding the number of co-ords? Z1720 (talk) 15:30, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

  The sustained quality of work done by the four coords is astounding. I searched the FAC Talk archives for the word "backlog" and it did not show up very much, so I'm not sure anything needs changing. On the other hand, life can be random, and in a group of four, there is a good chance that holidays/illness/family/job will put two or three out of commission at the same time. Increasing the number a bit could not hurt, but I'm not sure it is required, either. Noleander (talk) 15:51, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

  Agreed that the coords do an excellent job but adding another wouldn't hurt -- it's a volunteer role, so if we end up paying the princely salary of $0 for someone to be a little underworked (but to learn the ropes so that they can step up to a bigger role if ever needed in the future), that's $0 well spent in my book. Better to have more resources and not always need them than the reverse, I think. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 16:25, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

  I think keeping the number fairly small helps consistency, which in turn helps with the emphasis on quality, so I don't object to adding to the team if they need help but I wouldn't want to see it grow into a larger, less cohesive team. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 16:50, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

  I feel that as long as any new coords have been active reviewers around here beforehand, it wouldn't change up the cohesion of the team too much. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 02:33, 16 June 2026 (UTC)

I wouldn't really say we're in dire need of coords, just because this was the queue with three coords at lower activity levels (pretty much the worse case scenario, and we still aren't hitting major backlogs (as mentioned, there were fewer than 50 noms, and we aren't running into page transclusion issues, which is the sign when things are real bad.) If things do get worse then that's a situation where the coords have to be more harsh in closing borderline or minimally-attended FACs sooner, or noms that are dragging long. We're rarely suffering from people to close versus reviews to make closes easier. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^talk 00:14, 17 June 2026 (UTC)

Publication vs creation dates for images

It's a recurring theme in FAC image reviews that PD status is based on publication date, not creation date. There's an interesting discussion on commons VP where it was asserted that "We usually assume that documents are published around the date of creation unless evidence shows otherwise (e.g. source is a family archive)". This seems like a common-sense approach that should be used at FAC. RoySmith (talk) 11:25, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

I have noticed a couple of situations where FAC appears to have higher standards than Commons:

• There are lots of images in Commons that legally require "publication". Commons will host the images without proof of publication; but FAC reviewers will require proof of publication.
• There are lots of photos in Commons that are authored by person A, but uploaded by person B (who asserts without proof that person A provided a valid license). Commons will host those photos; but FAC reviewers will require proof that the author gave a license.

I have the feeling that Commons volunteers are overwhelmed with policing all the images they host: I'm sure there are many tens of thousands of images on Commons that don't have proper licensing/copyright data. Those images only get removed when someone notices and goes thru the process. FAC is an opportunity to scrutinize images that Commons folk have not yet gotten around to validating. But, yeah, FAC and Commons volunteers should follow the same criteria when they evaluate an image. Noleander (talk) 15:25, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

I think Roy is partly right that more common sense can be applied. To take your second example, in many cases the uploader is probably sat next to the "author". If we have no obvious reason to be sceptical, we should just accept it. Experienced patrollers and reviewers are good at getting a "feeling" for when something is off. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 16:37, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

Our standards are indeed higher than Commons', as written: WIAFA includes compliance with the image use policy, which requires that for images claimed to be PD, "You can prove that the image is in the public domain" (emphasis added), and similarly for freely licensed images "You can prove that the copyright holder has released the image". Conversely Commons follows the precautionary principle, which supports deletion of files only when there is significant doubt as to their freedom. An image could fall short of being provably free and still not be significantly doubtfully free. Nikkimaria (talk) 03:35, 11 June 2026 (UTC)

FWIW... I don't think we can or should assume that all images are published around creation absent evidence otherwise. Certainly some are, but I'd estimate that most are not. Nikkimaria (talk) 03:38, 11 June 2026 (UTC)

Yes -- the (draft?) template on Commons clarifies that this applies to cases when it would be unlikely that the image would be created if not for immediate publication, such as publicity photographs or commercial artwork. It certainly wouldn't apply to (say) private photographs or an artist's preliminary sketches, which might never have been intended for publication. UndercoverClassicist ^T·C 06:59, 11 June 2026 (UTC)

FAC mentor request for Regulus (Turner)

Hi, recently I've been revising my article on Regulus (Turner), and think it is of a suitable quality to take to FAC. As this would be my first FAC, I would like to request a mentor, primarily to make sure that the article is actually ready, and help guide me through the actual nomination process. While I have brought 5 articles up to GA, I am not especially familiar with what reviewers are looking for in a FA compared to a GA, and would like to learn more about this before nominating the article.

I am comfortable communicating on-wiki, but am much more available on Discord. I work in the Eastern Time Zone, and should be accessible on most days during the summer. Citrus🍋 20:07, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

@CitrusHemlock Start by listing it at WP:Peer review. Mention in your request that you are looking to bring it to FAC and also link it into {{FAC peer review sidebar}}. The FA criteria are listed at WP:FACR but sadly it's not really possible to understand what is expected until you've gone through the process a few times. RoySmith (talk) 20:30, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

Thank you, I have posted a peer review request here. Citrus🍋 20:42, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

@CitrusHemlock - Some tips for first-time FA nominators are at WP:FACFAQ. Noleander (talk) 22:59, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

Saw your comment on Discord. On a skim, it looks like it could do well at FAC. I've done some arty articles but mine are 3D. If you don't get a better offer, I'm happy to mentor informally but I don't have much time for the next few weeks. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 20:56, 10 June 2026 (UTC)

Another suggestion: check on WP:FA under Art and especially Paintings for recently promoted articles that are similar to yours and ask the author if they would be willing to take a look at your article. The best ones would be about other paintings by the same artist, or from the same time period. Recently promoted is important because that means the author is more likely to still be engaged. Also, while the formal requirements may be fairly static, the unwritten rules do drift over time so a recent nomination will more accurately reflect what you're going to. RoySmith (talk) 01:14, 11 June 2026 (UTC)

Vague anticedents

The next time I whine in a review about a vague anticedent, just think of this and you will have a smile on your face as you fix it. RoySmith (talk) 13:46, 12 June 2026 (UTC)

@RoySmith Thanks—I'll avoid any six-avocado moments next time I bring an article or review to FAC. MSincccc (talk) 10:45, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

An RfC on non-free photos of low-profile victims at Wikipedia talk:Non-free content

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Non-free content § RfC: Non-free pre-death photos of deceased individual low-profile victims in articles about primarily their own deaths. George Ho (talk) 21:01, 13 June 2026 (UTC)

FAC peer review sidebar

There's a bunch of aging review requests at {{FAC peer review sidebar}} which could use attention. I've been timing out the really old ones but I hate to have to do that because it leaves the author without any actionable feedback. In some cases, I'd just prefer for somebody else (uninvolved) to pull the plug. It's in all our best interests to take a look at these; the alternative is that poorly-prepared articles end up at FAC. RoySmith (talk) 13:07, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

Reviving a suggestion I made several months ago (which got no support at all :-) we could:

1. Create a new sidebar for "High-priority FAC-related tasks" which contains FACs needing reviews of any kind, as well as older PRs from Template:FAC peer review sidebar
2. Eliminate the WP:Featured article candidates/FAC urgents and WT:Featured article candidates/Image and source check requests, which would both be subsumed into the new list.

Alternatively: the entire "FAC peer review sidebar" list could be in this new list. Ideally, this new list should be formatted as a sidebar, so it could be displayed in other pages.

The goal is a "one stop shopping" page that editors could peruse to find high-priority tasks. Currently, we have to visit three places. This wouldn't directly solve the lack of PR attention problem RoySmith mentions above; but indirectly it might cause more eyeballs to see the needy PRs. Noleander (talk) 14:26, 15 June 2026 (UTC)

Deprecated archival service

One of the archiving websites that some editors have used is now deprecated and needs to be removed from all articles. You can read more about this at Wikipedia:Archive.today guidance. There are at least 1,400 affected FAs at the moment. We will probably start tagging articles with {{deprecated archival service}} soon, with a focus on articles that contain many such links. You might want to check your favorite FAs against the list of problematic domains. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:47, 18 June 2026 (UTC)

User:WhatamIdoing: Is it possible to generate a list of FAs and FLs that have these archives? Bgsu98 (Talk) 17:49, 18 June 2026 (UTC)

It looks like there are at least 1,300 affected FLs. As a rough estimate, that's about 20% of FAs and almost 30% of FLs. I'm sure that a complete list could be generated. I understand that it is easy to make such lists in Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser, though I've never used it myself.

For individual WikiProjects, you could use a bot-generated database report like Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Deprecated archival service, but that depends on the articles being tagged by a WikiProject that participates in Wikipedia:Content assessment. StefenTower might be able to adapt it to FA, FL, and GA pages.

https://fixarchive.toolforge.org/ (click on the 'Category' tab) will scan through <500 articles in a category at a time. If you tell it to search on Category:Featured articles, that would be another way to find articles that need to be fixed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:04, 18 June 2026 (UTC)

Seeking a FAC mentor

Hello, I'm a relatively new editor (~6 months), and I've written a few biographies of women in 18th-century France that were promoted to GA recently. Of those biographies, Perrine Dugué's article is the first one I want to try for FA status, and I've listed it for peer review. But ultimately I would like to get in touch with an FAC mentor who would consider helping me prepare for FAC. I checked the list of FAC mentors and didn't see anyone with a noted interest in 18th-century French history or the French Revolution, so I hope it's okay to ask here. Thank you so much — Chao Garden 🌱 ~ say hello 18:15, 19 June 2026 (UTC)

Looking at fr.wiki, it seems like there are sources that seem to be unused in our version. You should check it out before nominating it for FAC. Articles nominated for FAC here are expected to be well-researched. Vacant0 (talk • contribs) 19:36, 19 June 2026 (UTC)

Link your PR request into {{FAC peer review sidebar}} so it'll get attention from the FAC crowd. RoySmith (talk) 22:35, 19 June 2026 (UTC)

Seeking an FAC mentor for Rei Ayanami

I started a peer review at Wikipedia:Peer review/Rei Ayanami/archive2, and this is to prepare it for a joint FAC I plan to nominate with another user, TeenAngels1234. If we make the refinements listed in the peer review, this will be his first FAC and my first FAC with a co-nominator. I would like to have an FAC mentor provide guidance on the featured article candidacy process in that peer review and get a viewpoint from that FAC mentor about how we can make the article meet the featured article criteria. I may also do a subsequent Wikipedia:WikiJournal article nomination, but that depends on how well the FAC goes. My priority now is preparing the article for an FAC. I have added our request to the {{FAC peer review sidebar}}, so I appreciate help on a joint FAC. Thank you. Z. Patterson (talk) 12:16, 26 June 2026 (UTC)

Space Invaders Infinity Gene

Wikipedia:Peer review/Space Invaders Infinity Gene/archive1 has been open for over a month and not yet attracted any reviews. Perhaps somebody who is into video games could give it a look? RoySmith (talk) 23:06, 27 June 2026 (UTC)

I can do it. Noleander (talk) 12:49, 28 June 2026 (UTC)