Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/February 2023

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Good article reassessment/February 2023

A January 2023 AN discussion closed with consensus that:

  1. All Good articles by Doug Coldwell are [to be] delisted via a global process except for those articles where a reviewer has indicated an independent GA reassessment will be opened and can vouch for/verify content of all sources, including offline sources
  2. Users may remove any content Doug Coldwell added that is cited to an offline source
  3. Users are encouraged to wait on stubbing articles until the GAR process has had sufficient time to complete.

This page outlines the process and timeline for the Good article reassessment (GAR) of several hundred Good articles (GAs). It describes items to check and consider when stubbing content on those articles or attempting to assure GA status is retained.

The master list of articles to be reassessed for GA status can be found here.

The #Implementation details of the GAR merger were finalized on February 8, 2023. Please raise any general questions at the GAR talk page, and any questions specific to the Doug Colwell GA reassessment on the talk page here.

FAQ

1. What kinds of concerns need to be re-evaluated in these GAs and other content by the same editor?

Be familiar with all of the AN discussion and information in links to other discussions there. A Contributor copyright investigation has been opened, and presumptive deletion applies, but there may be other problems. One specific concern is the extensive use of old and offline sources that cannot be checked, and may be misrepresented.
There may be:
  1. Copyright problems including too-close-paraphrasing; content copied from sources; or failure to attribute, quote or re-word content from public domain sources
  2. Source-to-text integrity problems (either verification or original research) including misrepresentation of sources, inappropriate use of dated sources or non-independent sources
  3. POV issues that might originate in conflict of interest, for example, on Ludington, Michigan-related articles
  4. Claims from very old sources not backed by, or contradicted by, modern sources
  5. Copyright issues in images uploaded by Doug Coldwell
  6. Sources cited separately from the text they claim to represent, sometimes paragraphs away, which can conceal close paraphrasing or other forms of copyright problems.
  7. Insertion of decidedly private materials, such as personal correspondences containing private information, inserted by Doug Coldwell; any inclusion of personal information should be oversighted.

Earwig is insufficient to detect too-close paraphrasing, copying from newspapers.com clippings (which Earwig cannot see), or content taken from offline sources. Content was often copied from sandbox to the article in one initial edit, which should be examined. Other diffs to examine are listed at the 3-page contributor copyright investigation.

  • If you find any of the copyright issues above, remove it and start a talk page discussion, but do not copy copyvio material to the talk page, as that creates another copyright problem.
    • If a copyvio is material to the content of the page, request revision deletion using {{copyvio-revdel}} after removing the copyvio. It is not always necessary to use revision deletions on presumptive removals.
    • The templates {{subst:CCI}} (specifically {{subst:CCI|name=20210315}} for this case), {{subst:CCId}}, and {{subst:cclean}} can be used on talk pages to denote presumptive removal/stubbing, presumptive deletion, and copyvio removal respectively (the latter can also be used in combined copyvio and presumptive removals).
  • If a page cannot be salvaged or presumptive deletion is expedient, replace its entire content with {{subst:copyvio}} and follow the instructions on that template to list the page at Wikipedia:Copyright problems. The page will likely be deleted after a week if it is not rewritten.
  • Add your findings related to copyright under the article listing at the 3-page contributor copyright investigation; feedback will help advance the effort

2. I passed one of these GA: what do I need to do?

If you believe the GA should be delisted, you don't need to do anything. Unless someone else plans to open a GAR independent from those processed en masse, the GA will be delisted automatically when the bot runs (see #Implementation section).
If you want to improve the article anyway, see #FAQ 3.
If you believe the GA status might be retained, and plan to initiate an independent GAR to that effect, see #FAQ 3.

3. I believe one of these GAs can retain its GA status or be improved: what do I do?

To retain GA status, you need to be willing to open an independent GAR (according to the timeline at #Implementation) and able to verify all content cited to online and offline sources (see presumptive deletion). Please do not open a GAR until the #Implementation process outlined below is complete.
  1. Re-evaluate the content (see #FAQ 1) and discuss any problems found on article talk
  2. If you can locate sources online (for example, books at archive.org or articles at newspapers.com) please add them and verify content cited to them, or list them on the article talk page
  3. If you have access to an offline source, you may be asked during the GAR to place a significant enough quote from that source on article talk that all of the following can be evaluated: source-to-text integrity, copyright violations including too-close-paraphrasing, and POV
  4. If you plan to open an independent GAR (separate from those processed en masse), indicate so by listing the article at the talk page here so the article will not be delisted in the bot group run
  5. Open the independent GAR after the mass bot run (around February 23)
  6. Once the GARs are completed, anyone can stub any article on the list not passing GAR by removing any content cited to inaccessible sources (see PDEL, the January 2023 AN discussion and #FAQ 4), so in deciding whether to pursue a GAR, consider whether broad coverage can be preserved based on accessible sources

4. How and when should I stub a GA on the list?

For timing, see the #Implementation section.
Content that breaches Wikipedia's copyright policies can be removed at any time from any article; the AN proposals do not supersede legal policy, although the AN encouraged editors to hold off on content in GAs until the GAR processes are in place. After February 20, any content cited to an offline source can be removed from the articles remaining on the GA list (which will be culled to remove those that will undergo an independent GAR). It is suggested to place a list of the removed sources on article talk or in Further reading for future reference, and re-evaluate the remaining content, as there may still be too-close-paraphrasing, source-to-text integrity problems, or POV remaining even after the article is stubbed (see #FAQ 1).

5. I stubbed one of the articles on the master list but my edit was reverted.

See #FAQ 4. Did you follow those instructions?
If so, review the article talk page (see #FAQ 1) and the presumptive deletion policy and the January 2023 AN consensus. For example, check the talk page to see if someone placed content from the offline source there. If your edits complied with all, discuss that on talk. If still necessary, bring the issue to admin attention at the Administrators' noticeboard.

6. Can I resubmit to GAN a delisted article on the list?

Any delisted GA is eligible to be resubmitted for GA consideration, but you should be certain that everything in #FAQ 1 above has been considered, and that any content cited to offline content has been dealt with as explained.

Implementation and timeline

Outline:

  1. A mass message sender (MMS) talk page notice was posted to all relevant GA talk pages.
  2. Another notice was sent to GA reviewers of the articles
    If you want to opt out of these messages, or if you would like to receive messages even if you weren't one of the GA reviewers, you can add or remove yourself from this list
  3. Editors had until February 20 to indicate on the talk page here the articles on which they planned to open an independent reassessment; those articles were removed from the master list so the remainder on the list could be processed for delisting by bot
  4. On February 26, the GAN Review Tool completed processing the remaining GAs (those where an independent reassessment was not indicated) to effect a mass delisting by:
    Automated setup of a GAR page with a standard notice
    Automated closure and incorporation to {{Article history}}
  5. Articles not subject to an intent to open GAR can be stubbed (see #FAQ 4)
  6. The remaining independent GARs can be opened and will be processed as normal
    After GARs are completed, articles not passing can be stubbed (see #FAQ 4)