Wikipedia:Article Rescue Squadron/Self-assessment

Self-assessment

This subpage is created to facilitate self-evaluation by members of Wikipedia:Article Rescue Squadron. This is specifically designed to stand as a self-assessment of projects by their members. There is a separate final section for comments by non-members who have feedback, but I would request that non-members please do not respond in other sections.

The purpose is to identify what works and does not work for community groups on Wikimedia Foundation projects, to help promote good practices across projects. It is also intended to help brainstorm ways for community groups to reach out to new users interested in their areas, to help encourage growth for Wikipedia. I will be presenting information gathered from this conversation to the Wikimedia Foundation, both to help provide guidelines to other projects and to see if there is anything the Foundation can do to better facilitate your work.

Your contribution here is very much appreciated. There is certainly overlap in some of the questions and some of your responses may seem redundant; please don't worry about this. Brainstorming among project members is very welcome here, as it may help other responders to consider different aspects. Conversation can be helpful to generate a kind of consensus view among project members of the issues as well as to note individual opinions. Please feel free to add your answers below and to discuss the answers others have left. (If you are not a project member, please add your input in the final section.) Thanks! --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 11:16, 8 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Project member question: How "healthy" is your project?

Would you say that your project is thriving, declining, effectual, struggling, etc.? Do the members of the project interact well with one another? Do members typically feel welcome and included? This space is to share your opinion of the overall current status of your project.

IMO it's puttering along OK, its newsletter hasn't been published in a while, but the talk page has had 100 edits since July 28 2011. (Some of this is back-and-forth with the project's critics, but that could be taken as evidence of project health - alive and kicking). I feel welcome here and see its members interacting well. Novickas (talk) 13:09, 8 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Not healthy. It has few active participants. Of those few, a couple are very very slanted toward keeping and rescuing articles, nearly to the exclusion of reasonable arguments, and tend to view disagreements in terms of their allies and their opponents. New members are not welcomed, they are not turned away necessarily, but there's no real effort to integrate new people into ARS. Part of the problem is that a VAST majority, maybe over 90% of AfDs revolve around adaquate sourcing or attribution, which requires research in order to fix. This can be a time consuming and slow process, and the ARS' declared mission is to stop at the point of rescue, rather than continuing to improve articles after the AfD. In a sense, this could potentially be seen as the AfD nominator's spurring people into action to fix articles that lack substance or Wiki-approved attribution, which is a good thing, but at present these nominators are seen as adversaries by the 'regulars' at ARS. -- Avanu (talk) 13:52, 8 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Our project is declining in activity in comparison to mid-2009 when I joined it, but its still alive. I think the active members get along fine (though I miss Okip/Ikip). As for why activity has declined, I think that's a function of two things: (a) We have deterred some of the worst AfD nominations of notable subjects. I used to regularly be able to skewer a really bad AfD nomination by finding sources. I would relish defeating my deletionist enemies and laugh as they fumed and stomped off. But that is much less common now. (b) Some of the most inclusionist members have been driven off by deletionists. Year by year, the concepts of notability and where the lines are get more ingrained with active editors. You have far fewer people who question the very concept of notability and advocate for articles for every pokemon, porn star, etc. On the deletionist side, you have fewer editors who rail against every article on the latest celebrity or viral video star. The clunky but useful concept of WP:GNG goes a long way. The core mission of ARS to rescue articles that don't really need to be deleted remains, however.--Milowent • ^talkblp-r 21:14, 8 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

- I miss Okip/Ikip too. He recruited me in 2009 and here I still am. Maybe we don't have an equally outgoing member any more. About activity decline, I'd add that IMO WP:BEFORE is mentioned more often in Afds, which might be reducing the number of what you might call 'easy' rescues, but can't see any way to quantify that. Novickas (talk) 23:02, 9 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nutshell: Health

Thank you very much for your feedback. :) This is what I'm reading:

There is some dissenting opinion about the health of the project. Novickas and Milowent both seem to view it as alive and active. Novickas finds it welcoming and interactive. Avanu feels that it is unhealthy because the few participants are strongly motivated to achieve their own goals and take an adversarial view of those who disagree. Milowent speculates that the need for the project may have declined a bit because poorer nominations have declined and concepts such as notability are better defined, and Novickas notes that the addition of "BEFORE" to AfDs may have helped.

Please let me know if I've missed anything, and if you would like to add or expand or if this inspires further thoughts, you're certainly welcome to add them, whether you have already responded to the question or not. I hope that my nutshell accurately reflects your perspective; of course, your entire conversation will be linked from the final report which will allow for more nuanced review. :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 18:20, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Project member question: What does this project do well?

What are some of the best examples of this project's successes? This space is for exploring what your project does well--whether those successes are innovative (coming up with new ideas or approaches) or simply examples of successfully following through on established practices.

Hmm, project members might be more modest than the average bear. A lot of editors put GA or FA or DYK symbols on their user pages, with the rollover text reading "This user wrote X, a Featured Article". And the project itself might have an info-box thingy with number of FA, GA, DYKs, A-class articles, etc. There's no equivalent infobox section here or little rescue icon. This project might be unusually collaborative. A rescue generally involves multiple editors; someone tags it for rescue, others see it and point to sources at the Afd, other editors add sources to the article, other editors point these things out at the Afd. Novickas (talk) 23:57, 9 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nutshell: strengths

In this area, I see:

Members of the project may be less focused on individual accomplishments and more on collaborative achievement.

Remembering that the complete answers will be linked, is that about the long and short of it? Hard to nutshell a single response.:D --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 18:26, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Project member question: What challenges face your project?

In your opinion, what are the greatest challenges that your project faces or has faced in succeeding on Wikipedia? These challenges can be issues that you have overcome or issues that you are still facing.

Project member question: What could make this project fail?

In a "worst case" scenario, what circumstances could make this project fail?

The usual suspects. Long-term editors burning out, maybe tired of the conflicts, or just wanting to move to other hobbies. Few or no new ones coming in. Novickas (talk) 23:13, 9 September 2011 (UTC) P.S. Being human, editors will always make mistakes, including notability asessments, so as long as WP and its Afd processes exist, the usefulness of this project will continue too. Novickas (talk) 00:37, 10 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

There are a few editors who have taken up the banner of eliminating the project, and a few members who seem to believe that all articles should be kept regardless of sourcing or notability requirements. The tension between the two small groups has had, I think, a detrimental effect on the project overall. I think it would helpful if all editors would, for lack of a better term, lighten up a bit. If an editor is disruptive, unhelpful, or a drag on the community, that editor should be approached as an individual. --Nuujinn (talk) 00:22, 14 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nutshell: Failure

What I'm seeing here:

Decline of participating editors could cause this project to fail, although the need for it seems unlikely to decline. Ideological conflicts between extremists at either end - those who believe the project should be eliminated and those who want to keep all articles regardless of quality - create tension.

Is that about right? --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 18:41, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That seems fair enough, but I would suggest that the numbers of editors at the poles are small, even if they are quite vocal. Editors on the extremes of both sides tend to paint with a wide brush, and I think that presents a distorted view of the daily grind of AFD. --Nuujinn (talk) 21:30, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Project member question: Where could this project improve?

In your opinion, what steps could the members of this WikiProject take to help reach its goals (however your project's goals are defined)?

Project member question: How can this project expand?

How can this project reach out to and nurture newcomers to Wikipedia who share an interest in the project's goals?

Education and mentorship for authors to help them write articles that don't even need to be rescued, or can mount an instant defense to a 'premature' AfD. In many cases, we see a fledgling author try to create a new article, and some editors pounce on this newborn, somtimes within minutes of its creation, citing its lack of sources, while the author is still just trying to get it fleshed out. I would say such AfDs are probably disruptive and inappropriate, but i'm sure it depends on the specific circumstances. Educating users about ways to begin articles in userspace, or gain collaborative help before placing articles in mainspace might help. Getting an ARS Mentor, an assigned person to help the article author, and having a tag as such when the article is placed into Mainspace, so that potentially AfD tags are staved off because an experienced and trusted editor is working with this editor might serve as a less confrontational approach to rescue. All such things require editors who deeply care about article rescue and improvement and have the time and leadership skills to carry them out, and this is a relatively rare thing and requires a dedication beyond just simple editing. But I think that programs like this could help ARS improve, not forgetting the Rescue Tag as well, but it would help ARS be seen as a content advocate, rather than just a "Keep" vote in the odd discussion here and there. -- Avanu (talk) 14:01, 8 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Avanu about education and mentorship of new editors as a goal, although it is, as A notes, quite a commitment. Reaching out to strangers you've just met on the Internet - or responding to them - is hard for some of us. Referencing using reliable sources is hard to teach and to learn. Avanu emphasizes articles created by newcomers, I have a somewhat different take on this. Sometimes they're for articles that've sat around for a while without good refs. Those were common in the olden days. Also, any kind of outreach would be a touchy area, because this project has been nominated for deletion four times. I think most of the old hands are aware of this and go out of their way to avoid even the appearance of canvassing. Novickas (talk) 22:33, 8 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nutshell: Expansion

I see several strong ideas here.

ARS could reach out to proactively prevent unnecessary deletions by educating and mentoring authors to help them write articles less likely to be nominated for deletion, possibly marking articles as being under the guidance of such a person. Challenges here include time commitment required of volunteers, inherent difficulties in approaching strangers, and possible misinterpretation by outsiders. This approach would not be effective with older articles created when criteria were more relaxed.

More? Less? Wrong? :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 20:12, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

ARS could do that, but I would suggest that those issues are more a problem with the procedures of AFD than problems associated with ARS. I do think there is potential for some of this, but I'm not sure how that would work really. Personally, I would like to see a userfy option for new articles, if an article is substandard, get rough consensus to userfy it and give some guidance to the author, and refer them to request for feedback. Or perhaps a PROD variant, proposed for rescue--nominate the article for help from ARS, give it a week or two, and if ARS doesn't do anything, auto-delete it? --Nuujinn (talk) 21:39, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Non-member comments

If you are not a member of the project but would like to add your own observations related to the health of the project, its accomplishments and challenges and ways that it can improve, please do so here. Thank you.

Just would like to bring attention to two proposal I've created to change the way this project operates for the better. The first one is primarily to disallow ARS members from voting at rescue-tagged AfD's, and the second one (written only a few days ago) is to make article rescue a post-AfD activity. —SW— ^squeal 13:53, 8 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I will include links to your ideas in my report as well. :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 20:14, 13 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]