Welcome, subscribers, to the inaugural Discontent Content newsletter! Discontent Content is a newsletter aiming to collate and improve Wikipedia articles in need of more eyes and hands to get them in shape. Its unique trimodal structure allows editors to work where they feel comfortable -- with stubs and starts needing to be brought to standard, mid-quality articles with Good or Featured potential, or quality-assessed articles needing help to maintain their status.
Category 1
Articles in this category are those that need to be brought up to a minimum quality standard. Some will be stubs; others will be longer articles that nonetheless have significant concerns putting them far below B- or C-class adequacy.
This issue's Category 1 articles are:
Community Outreach Academy Elementary: A recent AfD survivor, this is one of those entertaining exceptions to the 'primary schools aren't notable' rule. How many primary schools do you know of that host Cossack militias and are endorsed by foreign embassies? Sadly, the article itself is far from representative of the school's wealth of eccentric coverage. The AfD may provide a jumping-off point for an interested writer to cover a 'run-of-the-mill' topic that's anything but.
Holy Diver (song): One of the signatures of metal legend Ronnie James Dio, this start-class article barely touches on almost forty years of history, analysis, and veneration. With literally hundreds of interviews, pages upon pages of Google Books hits, and more than a few cover versions, there's enough sourcing to cover an article many times this one's size and status.
Character class: One of the most fundamental aspects of role-playing games, this is a sad case of "Start class/Top importance". A big topic with a big history, this article is just begging for some dedicated writers to sit down and shape it into something beautiful. According to the article's talk page, this is also mirrored on at least one Fandom wiki, so getting it into shape will have broader consequences outside Wikipedia alone.
Category 2
Articles in this category, while in better current shape than Category 1, are still missing something. They have the potential to be truly high-quality content, and may have been at one point. With work, they can be brought up to dizzying heights.
This issue's Category 2 articles are:
Border Collie: This article for one of the world's most popular dog breeds is a Million Award candidate. Now at B-class, it's had a few separate issues raised on the talk page throughout its history regarding various sorts of inter-owner drama. There's a good skeleton here, and some meat on its bones would make a comprehensive reference work.
Cool World: A former GA delisted just last month, Nathan Rabin's spectacular piece for The A.V. Club back in 2007 (quite the source in its own right) comments that Wikipedia has a great entry on this, and it can again. The story of this film's failure, notorious in animation circles, is chronicled in depth in as many sources as a curious writer looking to bring this article back to glory could want. Quarter Million-tier yearly pageviews sweeten the deal.
American poetry: This big topic was an early FA -- could you make it one again? Now stymied by unsourced and dated additions, this article deserves the same artistic virtue as the works it describes.
Category 3
Articles in this category have been assessed through a content review process in the past, but may require work to be brought up to current GA/FA standard. Editors can help bring them to a level where the star or plus near their names can once again shine.
This issue's Category 3 articles are:
Python (programming language): This 2007 GA (swept in 2009) has been recommended for reassessment, although no GAR has been opened. With over two and a half million views a year, the readers of this widely read article deserve the best they can get.
Grunge: The sound of the 1990s is an FA currently undergoing review. The FAR discusses overquoting, prose, cite formatting, and length as issues -- all matters a knowledgeable editor can help with. This important article has had a star since 2005, and deserves help to keep it.
Icelandic Naming Committee: A short GA on an oddball topic with outstanding maintenance tags, in need of updating and perhaps expansion. Editors interested in going into a unique subject are encouraged to get this one back up to standard.
Letter from the Editor
Hello, wonderful people, and welcome to the very first Discontent Content! I'm glad you're here, and I'm looking forward to seeing what you can do. In future issues, I hope to use this section to brag about the achievements of subscribers -- so why not go do something worth bragging about?
Article improvement initiatives have a long and storied history on this project, and I'm honoured to add myself to the list of people trying to find one that works. My perhaps quixotic goal here is to unify a few different issues -- the maintenance of old quality-assessed articles (GAs in particular) and the sheer length of the long left tail -- in one fell swoop. I'd be happy if this ended in something like another GA sweep; I'd be happier if it ended in another GA sweep where those GAs got kept. I'd be even happier than that if this resulted in the improvement of our worst articles, not just our best. I believe in the project, and I believe in what we can be.
