Wikipedia talk:Featured articles
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Splitting for Television episode sub-section?
[edit]Currently, the sub-section for television episode FAs houses 93 articles, and there are 3 different episodes up for FAC right now, some particularly close to promotion, only bringing the total up. So, I propose splitting this into 2 sub-sections between episodes from the 20th century and episodes from the 21st century. It seems like it’s almost an exact half split between these two eras, so I think it would be easier to navigate if done this way, and would make sense. I’d be willing to do this split, but I wanted to ask the community first Crystal Drawers 🍌 (wanna talk?) 23:28, 27 March 2026 (UTC)
Categories
[edit]Today's run of Special:WantedCategories featured a couple dozen non-empty redlinked categories of the "Wikipedia featured topics...good content" or "Wikipedia featured topics...featured content" variety, where the categories recently got moved to new names, but the content in them didn't get moved because the categories were template-generated automatic transclusions rather than direct in-text category declarations — thus meaning that the pages were still sitting in the redlinks, violating WP:REDNOT, while the updated category names were all empty categories, that were vulnerable to speedy deletion for being empty, because the pages hadn't been moved to the new categories.
Each of the categories had somewhere between 5 and 25 pages in it, forcing me to gnome my way through manually updating a couple hundred pages to the bluelinked categories — but just within the past two hours, I've had two instances of somebody else coming along and mass-reverting bunches of the pages back into the redlinked categories, where again they can't be filed because pages can't be in redlinked categories.
Since it isn't my job to take any shit from anybody for cleaning up redlinked categorization errors that required cleanup, and just leaving pages filed in redlinked categories is always an absolute and total non-starter that never has any legitimate reason for it under any circumstances, could somebody here please take whatever steps are necessary to ensure that this stops happening? Thanks. Bearcat (talk) 20:15, 16 April 2026 (UTC)
- Wikipedia:Featured topics is a different process. DrKay (talk) 21:16, 16 April 2026 (UTC)
Hurricane Erika (2003)
[edit]The article Hurricane Erika (2003) was redirected. It was still indicated as a Featured article on the talk page, so some pages are likely to still list it as a Featured article. Tbhotch™ (CC BY-SA 4.0) 05:23, 22 May 2026 (UTC)
Bad style "overview" section found in 39 current FAs
[edit]Template:Overview section states that "an overview section duplicates the intended purpose of the article's lead section, which should provide an overview of the subject. Please merge it with the introduction, move its content to other sections, or retitle the section to give it a clear scope. It does not seem to be widely used, however. Affected articles (Category:Wikipedia articles with inappropriate overview sections) include 39 Featured Articles, although almost none are templated with it. The template seems to represent the spirit of WP:LEAD in general ("The lead should stand on its own as a concise overview of the article's topic") and MOS:INTRO in particular (that very section is entitled "Provide an accessible overview").
I recently suggested that a bot should add this template to all affected articles (ones with overview sections), but the template does not seem to be actually recommend for use in the project space aside from being included in Wikipedia:Template index/Cleanup, it has no discussion talk page even. It might be good idea to double check it has consensus, and I wanted to bring it with FA regulars here, since, per the query above, almost 40 articles were, over the years, approved as Featured without, apparently, anyone raising the issue of the overview section being inappropriate. Thoughts? Do we have a real problem here that should be templated? Or should this template be discussed for deletion for suggesting something is a problem when it isn't? Myself, I lean towards endorsing this template, and common-sense, lead is an overview, and having two de-facto leads seems bad style. But - what do you - readers of WT:FA, arguably gatekeepers of Wikipedia's highest quality content - think? Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:49, 23 September 2026 (UTC)
- In some cases the section is simply mistitled; in others I would agree that reorganization is needed. Nikkimaria (talk)
- @Nikkimaria Thank you for commenting. Seems my question is not drawing much attention - did I pose it in the wrong forum? Relevant to FA, should we FAR all 39 articles with this problem? I'll ping@Z1720 for 3O... In the meantime, I will also propose adding the mention of this template to Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section in that page talk (although I now see that Template:Introduction cleanup templates, which includes this and other relevant templates, is mentioned in the MOS there already). Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 00:06, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- If your question is FAR yes/no this is a reasonable forum, but I don't think a mass FAR would be warranted - as noted, in some cases the fix is very simply retitling the section. More broadly, I think the template is a reasonable one where the section is a true lead extension/substitute. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:10, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- @Piotrus: If the only problem can be fixed by moving information into the lead, then it probably doesn't warrant an FAR. If the overview section has information not in the lead, or there are other problems throughout the article, then an FAR may be warranted. With 39 articles tagged with this, I do not have the time to go through them all, so I will leave it to others to either fix the issues or post it to FAR. Z1720 (talk) 00:16, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- @Nikkimaria @Z1720 Certainly a mass 39 FAR wouldn't be ideal, to say the least, but I am thinking over the next few weeks/months I'll be starting the usual FAR processes for them (first a talk page query, then a FAR if nobody fixes them). The problem is that 1) merging into the lead is not as easy as it sounds, as it requires checking whether information in this section is duplicated in body (as any lead info should be) or not, 2) dealing with references which lead should not have and 3) dealing with lead size, which may become too large after merging. So the problem is surmountable but requires more than just removing a heading, sigh. In other words, "moving information into the lead" is not as simple as it sounds :( Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 00:52, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- @Piotrus: "In other words, "moving information into the lead" is not as simple as it sounds :(" Totally understand that sentiment. If its a process that would take a lot of editor time, then those who are the most interested are probably in the best position to make those fixes. It's OK if that is not you, and posting on the talk page or FAR sometimes encourages editors to step up and make the necessary fixes. Z1720 (talk) 01:06, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- It looks like a majority of these are snooker articles, so probably worth dropping a line to that project also. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:36, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- You just beat me to it Nikki, I was going to suggest the same thing. For the rest, starting with talk page notices would be the right way. In general it's not something that bothers me unduly nor, it seems, did it bother the reviewers of the relevant FACs (though I notice the overview template is relatively recent, from 2021) but FAs should certainly be exemplars of the MOS. I also think that in some cases re-heading will work. For instance in Dream of the Rarebit Fiend the overview section looks like "background" to me and the current background section would work well as "development" so I'm going to be bold, retitle them, and see how that goes. I might stop by a few others as time permits. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:52, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- Following up, Nikki I see you've recently edited the three covered bridge articles on the list. IMO we could simply retitle the overview section "description". WDYT? Shall we be bold, or ask the bridges and tunnels project what they'd do? Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 02:24, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- That's fine with me. Nikkimaria (talk) 02:32, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- @Ian Rose Good point; sometimes a simple renaming of the section would work, but this needs to be done on a case by case basis, preferably by someone familiar with the topic. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 01:23, 7 October 2026 (UTC)
- Following up, Nikki I see you've recently edited the three covered bridge articles on the list. IMO we could simply retitle the overview section "description". WDYT? Shall we be bold, or ask the bridges and tunnels project what they'd do? Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 02:24, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- You just beat me to it Nikki, I was going to suggest the same thing. For the rest, starting with talk page notices would be the right way. In general it's not something that bothers me unduly nor, it seems, did it bother the reviewers of the relevant FACs (though I notice the overview template is relatively recent, from 2021) but FAs should certainly be exemplars of the MOS. I also think that in some cases re-heading will work. For instance in Dream of the Rarebit Fiend the overview section looks like "background" to me and the current background section would work well as "development" so I'm going to be bold, retitle them, and see how that goes. I might stop by a few others as time permits. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:52, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- It looks like a majority of these are snooker articles, so probably worth dropping a line to that project also. Nikkimaria (talk) 01:36, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- @Piotrus: "In other words, "moving information into the lead" is not as simple as it sounds :(" Totally understand that sentiment. If its a process that would take a lot of editor time, then those who are the most interested are probably in the best position to make those fixes. It's OK if that is not you, and posting on the talk page or FAR sometimes encourages editors to step up and make the necessary fixes. Z1720 (talk) 01:06, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- If your question is FAR yes/no this is a reasonable forum, but I don't think a mass FAR would be warranted - as noted, in some cases the fix is very simply retitling the section. More broadly, I think the template is a reasonable one where the section is a true lead extension/substitute. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:10, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- Template:Overview section isn't exactly policy, is it? I don't normally like "Overview" sections, but I think this is overprescriptive, especially where the lead is already long for some reason. Yes this is the right place to ask; no we should certainly not fire off FARs for all of them. Johnbod (talk) 14:58, 5 October 2026 (UTC)
- @Johnbod When the lead is long, having a second lead doesn't make sense IMHO. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 00:56, 7 October 2026 (UTC)
- To get more input on this I started Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#"Overview"_sections_and_MOS:LEAD. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 01:54, 7 October 2026 (UTC)
- I have to say it boggles the mind an editor with 20 years experience can try and mass-tag tens of thousands of articles based on vibes and not consider getting wide feedback on it first until multiple people told you to. {{Overview section}} is not policy, it's barely used, I can't even find a proximate discussion that inspired its creation in the first place so we could see if it even ever had some widespread agreement on how it relates to LEAD. There's nothing settled on its use beyond the status quo that not many people use it. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 12:45, 7 October 2026 (UTC)
- An article having to leads (overviews, summaries, abstracts) is not a good idea. You don't need 20 years of experience to know that. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:26, 8 October 2026 (UTC)
- I know of at least one hospital article that is not a featured that has an overview section, I am going to tag it, since to me having an overview section is a bad idea. Catfurball (talk) 17:47, 9 October 2026 (UTC)
- An article having to leads (overviews, summaries, abstracts) is not a good idea. You don't need 20 years of experience to know that. Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:26, 8 October 2026 (UTC)
Discusssions about individual articles
[edit]To hopefully avoid FARs, and improve the articles in question by dealing with that ambigious section title, I am going to start some talk page discussions on relevant articles. Feel free to join! --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 01:50, 10 October 2026 (UTC)
- Talk:IMac_G4#Merge_"Description"_and_"Specifications"? (note: Overview was renamed; I am further suggesting a merge with another section).
- Talk:2017_World_Snooker_Championship#Problematic_overview_section - Here, some simple renaming and changing the section level may be enough. This may also apply to several other similar snooker FAs.
A query
[edit]Is it possible for an article to be retroactively removed from a user on Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by featured article nominations? I don't quite know how the bot works in this respect, since it goes off the static year-end summary lists, but I've always felt that it's misrepresentative to list me as a co-nom for History, since I really contributed very little to that nomination due to unexpected busyness at the time. Generalissima (talk) (it/she) 13:43, 18 October 2026 (UTC)
- It's technically possible, but a good part of the credit for an FA is for preparation -- it's not just for shepherding it through the FAC process. I wouldn't worry about it -- unless you really didn't do anything to prep the article either. And even then it's not that important -- I have (and I'm sure I'm not the only one) credits on that list that are hugely variable in how much work I put in. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:02, 18 October 2026 (UTC)