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Famous Deaths in 2022 at ITN

Latest comment: 1 year ago102 comments19 people in discussion

For Barbara Walters' recent death, there was the usual argument about whether she should get a blurb or not. My immediate reaction was that this was a case of bias as we had just blurbed two famous men but were not giving such famous women equal prominence. But theories require testing against the evidence and so I did an initial review of the stats for 2022 which I posted into her nomination. That was immediately closed to shut down discussion so here's a table of relevant cases FYI.

I'm not sure there's a sex bias as Queen Elizabeth has a massive lead over the field though she is quite sui generis. But what I am noticing is that Americans don't seem to get much blurbing. If it wasn't for Betty White, they wouldn't have had any last year and she actually died in 2021. The stats are a bit distorted for figures like Walters and White who died near the year end. White actually got 17 million views for 2021–2022 while Walters' current readership spike is 2 million and counting.

If there seem to be any major errors or omissions then feel free to add or adjust accordingly.

Andrew🐉(talk) 16:40, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

Table

Subject	Views in 2022 (million)	Sex	ITN	Nationality	Grade	Vital level
Elizabeth II	43.57	F	blurb	UK/Commonwealth	FA	4
Bob Saget	9.15	M	RD	US	C
Pelé	8.19	M	blurb	Brazil	GA	4
Betty White	8.06	F	blurb	US	B	5
Taylor Hawkins	7.76	M	RD	US	C
Ray Liotta	7.68	M	RD	US	C
Olivia Newton-John	7.49	F	RD	Australia/UK	B	5
Shinzo Abe	5.82	M	blurb	Japan	B	5
Meat Loaf	5.68	M	snub	US	C	5
Mikhail Gorbachev	5.47	M	blurb	Soviet Union/Russia	GA	4
Kirstie Alley	5.46	F	RD	US	C
Lata Mangeshkar	5.44	F	blurb	India	B	4
Robbie Coltrane	4.53	M	RD	UK	C
James Caan	4.49	M	RD	US	C	5
Ivana Trump	4.43	F	RD	Czech/US	B
Angela Lansbury	4.29	F	RD	UK/US	GA
Sidney Poitier	4.28	M	RD then blurb	Bahamas/US	C	4
Shane Warne	4.09	M	blurb	Australia	C	4
Gilbert Gottfried	4.05	M	snub	US	C
William Hurt	3.99	M	RD	US	C	5
Coolio	3.81	M	RD	US	B
Jerry Lee Lewis	3.49	M	snub	US	C	5
Christine McVie	3.41	F	RD	UK	B
Loretta Lynn	3.14	F	RD	US	B	5
Bill Russell	2.93	M	RD	US	FA	5
Pope Benedict XVI	2.58	M	blurb	Germany/Vatican	B	5
Barbara Walters	2.48	F	RD	US	B	5
Irene Cara	2.09	F	snub	US	Start
Madeleine Albright	1.86	F	RD	US	B
Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan	1.68	M	blurb	UAE	C	5
Franco Harris	1.66	M	RD	US	C
Vivienne Westwood	1.62	F	RD	UK	C	5
Ayman al-Zawahiri	1.55	M	blurb	Egypt/al-Qaeda	B	5
Fred Ward	1.43	M	snub	US	Start
Cyrus Mistry	1.43	M	snub	India	C
Nichelle Nichols	1.30	F	RD	US	B	5
Jiang Zemin	1.28	M	blurb	PRC	C	5
Ivan Reitman	1.26	M	snub	Czech/Canada	C
John Aniston	1.25	M	snub	Greece/US	Start
Peter Bogdanovich	1.23	M	RD	US	C	5
Dennis Waterman	1.19	M	RD	UK	Start
Jean-Luc Godard	1.13	M	blurb	France/Switzerland	B	4
Kane Tanaka	1.08	F	RD	Japan	C
Bernard Cribbins	0.95	M	RD	UK	C
Vangelis	0.94	M	RD	Greece	B	5
Sally Kellerman	0.88	F	RD	US	C
Mino Raiola	0.86	M	RD	Netherlands/Italy	C
Grant Wahl	0.84	M	RD	US	Start
Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi	0.79	M	blurb	Iraq/Islamic State	C
Thích Nhất Hạnh	0.75	M	blurb	Vietnam	A	5
Leslie Phillips	0.73	M	RD	UK	Start
Vladimir Zhirinovsky	0.72	M	RD	Soviet Union/Kazakhstan/Russia	B
Shireen Abu Akleh	0.70	F	RD	Palestine/US	B
Hilary Mantel	0.58	F	RD	UK	B	5
Guy Lafleur	0.52	M	RD	Canada	B	5
P. J. O'Rourke	0.51	M	RD	US	C
Bobby Rydell	0.51	M	RD	US	C
Orrin Hatch	0.50	M	RD	US	C	5
Darya Dugina	0.50	F	RD	Russia	Start
Antonio Inoki	0.47	M	snub	Japan	C	5
Fidel V. Ramos	0.46	M	snub	Philippines	C	5
Man of the Hole	0.45	M	RD then blurb	Tanaru	GA
Issey Miyake	0.44	M	RD	Japan	Start
Ken Starr	0.41	M	RD	US	B	5
Barry Cryer	0.40	M	RD	UK	C
Monica Vitti	0.39	F	RD	Italy	C	5
Leonid Kravchuk	0.38	M	RD	Poland/Soviet Union/Ukraine	B	5
Luc Montagnier	0.31	M	snub	France	C	5
Lester Piggott	0.30	M	RD	UK	C	5
Raymond Briggs	0.30	M	RD	UK	C
Irene Papas	0.29	F	RD	Greece	GA
Gaylord Perry	0.29	M	RD	US	B
Mwai Kibaki	0.29	M	RD	Kenya	B
José Eduardo dos Santos	0.27	M	blurb	Angola	Start	5
Valeri Polyakov	0.25	M	RD	Soviet Union/Russia	GA	5
James Lovelock	0.23	M	RD	UK	B	5
Richard Leakey	0.21	M	RD	Kenya	C	5
Freddy Rincón	0.20	M	snub	Columbia	Start
Bernard Shaw (journalist)	0.18	M	RD	US	Start
Neal Adams	0.16	M	RD	US	B
John Bird (actor)	0.14	M	snub	UK	Start
Muhammad Rafiq Tarar	0.14	M	RD	Pakistan	Start
Luis Echeverría	0.14	M	RD	Mexico	C	5
Frank Drake	0.10	M	RD	US	Start
Gian Piero Ventrone	0.10	M	RD	Italy	Start
David Cox (statistician)	0.07	M	RD	UK	Start
George Crumb	0.07	M	RD	US	C
Bujar Nishani	0.07	M	RD	Albania	Start
Nagaenthran K. Dharmalingam	0.07	M	RD	Malaysia	C
Stanislav Shushkevich	0.07	M	snub	Soviet Union/Belarus	Start
Cristina Calderón	0.06	F	RD	Chile	Start
Olga Kachura	0.05	F	snub	Soviet Union/Ukraine	Start
Autherine Lucy	0.04	F	snub	US	Start

Discussion

I suggest that discussion start here. FWIW, my position is that all recent deaths should get a brief description or blurb to explain to the reader who they were. Most of the names at RD are not familiar and just having a ticker of such vague names isn't much use. Other languages such as the German Wikipedia have a better Obituary section in which all entries are given a similar format and this seems clearer, more informative and more objective. If we did this then the arguments whether to blurb or not would be avoided. Andrew🐉(talk) 16:40, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

Albright, Poitier and Russell all merited a blurb if not for the instinctive bias against featuring anything American at ITN. nableezy - 16:48, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

See Hindsight bias. But we are also not obligated to give everyone who "deserves" a blurb a blurb. Basically we put them up when we feel like it. As to the suggestion for a blurb for everyone, If a reader wants to see all the recent deaths they click on the recent deaths link and there is the list you just described and if the reader has popups enabled, they can see the article lead and top picture from each bio page by just hovering over the link. It might seem that women get less blurbs. From the list 3 out of 16 women got a blurb (18%) and 12 out of 43 men got a blurb (28%). However, if you only consider the ones over 4 million views, it's 3 out of 7 women (42%) vs 4 out of 10 men (40%). So, it might seem we are doing a good job. Richard-of-Earth (talk) 19:21, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

Trending topics. My prelim views are that we do not need be making any major changes to WP:ITN or WP:ITNRD based on the above data. However, I think this might be time to introduce a trending topics section either as a part of the WP:ITN box or outside of that. It does reflect quite poor if our mainpage after all these years is still fairly static in its content refresh capability and is not dynamic i.e. tailored either based on audience interest (trending topics), geographic interest (trending near you), or personalized reccos (tailored for you). Trending topics reflects the lowest level of personalization but is still dynamic, whereas tailored for you is the highest level of personalization, while trending near you is in between. This can either be text-based links or better still, images. Requires some amount of creative thinking and might not be in the remit of this group which is largely in a maintenance and operations mode. Ktin (talk) 21:14, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

It is important for us to consider the disparate impact of our practices as to what gets posted. Look at the opposition for Bill Russell[1] and compare to Lata Mangeshkar[2]. All those votes that torpedoed BR would equally apply to LM but are conspicuously absent. Why? GreatCaesarsGhost 22:14, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

I can not speak for the entirety of the community, but I think it could have to do with the individual's note amongst the editing community. Seeing as we are discussing the English language page and Russell was American, we can assume a large number of American responses. I did not vote on Russell's nom, but I know enough about Russell to the point where I considered voting. I would probably have voted "Oppose" at the time. Before the nom for Lata Mangeshkar, however, I did not know of her or her impact, so I chose to abstain from the start. While India has a solid English-speaking population, it's very possible that a higher percentage of the votes were from those who are not Indian, and the non-domestic vote is likely to have a large impact on the posting of a nom because if a person is not known very well internationally, it's not hard to believe that the person's impact may have been narrow. It stands to reason that Mangeshkar may have been more brpadly impactful in large part because of her field (Sportspeople may be well known, but basketball is not nearly as notable as several other sports - I think Shane Warne receiving a blurb and Russell not would perhaps be a good example of this). Just my two cents. DarkSide830 (talk) 00:44, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Basketball vs cricket

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

You think cricket is more "notable" than basketball? Its played by members of the commonwealth and basically nobody else. nableezy - 03:17, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

That's the kind of really dumb, pointless comment that leads to discussions going right off the rails. HiLo48 (talk) 04:10, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

I'm sure that a group of 56 countries representing over 2.4 billion people is quite significant in itself. Then you can add a few hundred million people from the USA, even though they're not very good at it. Chrisclear (talk) 03:39, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

As opposed to the population of countries that field a basketball team every olympics? Including pretty much all of the commonwealth? nableezy - 03:43, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
The largest number of countries that have fielded a basketball team at an Olympics is 24. That's less than half of the Commonwealth, even if they did enter, which they don't. I don't know what Olympics you're watching. That's also one tournament every four years. Popularity, notability, as it is statistically measured uses the health of the regular domestic leagues and number of fans, things like that. Team GB don't usually enter a football team at the Olympics, does that mean that football is not played in the UK? Get off it. Kingsif (talk) 03:54, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

There are 213 mens basketball national teams. Those that qualify for games are a fraction. Sort of like the fraction that qualifies for the World Cup. Get off it indeed. nableezy - 04:04, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

You literally said most of the Commonwealth fields a basketball team at every Olympics. That is literally your comment. I also noted that this is not relevant in football myself, so it does your 'argument' no good to bring that up lol, coming back with NBA vs IPL stats would have been more useful for you. Kingsif (talk) 04:11, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Add qualifiers if you feel like it. My point was that basketball is much more widely played around the world. Outside of one self-important club of nations at least. nableezy - 04:16, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Cricket is the second-biggest sport in the world only after association football. As you also note, the vast majority of the people playing cricket are English speakers, and this is English Wikipedia. Basketball is still a popular sport, it comes in third, but of course, besides the US, it's most popular in Spain, the Philippines, China, and Russia. Not English. This is all tangential, I suppose, that death blurbs are subjective. But your random interjection is an example of a kind of 'subjective' argument that comes up at such ITNCs that are really just falsehoods or at least bias-based opinions stated as facts. Kingsif (talk) 03:50, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Well over half of the population that watches or plays cricket is Asian, not English speakers. nableezy - 04:01, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Stupid, ignorant comment. Stop it now. You're not helping your case. HiLo48 (talk) 04:12, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Im sorry, what? Somebody said the vast majority of the people playing cricket are English speakers. That is false. And I said it is false. The number of times youve said something stupid and ignorant that Ive ignored is not going to increase this one time, but Im sure it will again rise in the near future. You dont need to respond to me. nableezy - 04:14, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

200 million people in India speak English, around 15%. It's 49% of Pakistan. (per our articles) Like, the sharing of English was a big part of the Commonwealth. Of course, you are choosing to ignore that the majority of people watching and playing basketball are Asian, too, from non-English nations. Kingsif (talk) 04:07, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

No I dont ignore that, I just thought it was funny when saying your random interjection is an example of a kind of 'subjective' argument that comes up at such ITNCs that are really just falsehoods you provide a falsehood as a random interjection. nableezy - 04:11, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

The vast majority of people playing cricket speaking English is not a falsehood, you know apparently nothing about cricket and the Commonwealth, I invite you to get off it. Kingsif (talk) 04:12, 3 January 2023 (UTC) (Speaking of, I only responded in the first place, with a non-random interjection mind, to point out that comments like your original one are the kind of falsehoods or bias stuff presented as fact that we want to avoid when trying to have discussions of death blurbs at ITNC. I may disagree with HiLo at times, but they see it and said it, too. How you doubled down on your ignorance is further proof of that point. Kingsif (talk) 04:23, 3 January 2023 (UTC))

Like most people around the world, you are right I dont care at all about cricket. nableezy - 04:17, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

More people around the world care about cricket than basketball. You need say no more, and please don't. Kingsif (talk) 04:19, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Certainly not among readers of the English Wikipedia based on readership volume by country. nableezy - 04:21, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

I don't even know where to start with this. India actually makes up a big chunk of the non-American English Wikipedia readers. I've helped curate the top 25 for over 2 years and, outside of players dying, can tell you cricket has featured and basketball hasn't in that time; I also know from this that wrestling, by readership, is far more popular than any other sport, which doesn't reflect the world (and likely main page readers) at large, so it's irrelevant. Like, at least three angles of you're just ignorant and digging. Kingsif (talk) 04:31, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

See here there are stats. US readers account for 40% of page views. Thats more than the entire commonwealth combined. But Im the ignorant one here. nableezy - 04:36, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

You see where I said of the non-American when referring to English Wikipedia readership? 👍🏼 Kingsif (talk) 04:45, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I do. You see where I said readers of the English Wikipedia but not removing the largest chunk from that? It was argued that 2.5 billion people of the commonwealth signifies the importance of the topic of cricket to the English Wikipedia. But somehow the fact that this 2.5B still makes up a smaller portion of views than the US doesnt matter to that argument. Anyway, I wouldnt have even voted against the Aussie cricketeer lol, I wouldnt have cared at all. But the idea that basketball is somehow only played in the US or that it is somehow "less notable" than cricket is stupid. And so was this vote by the person who now says they have no way of objectively judging it. nableezy - 04:52, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

I made my comment hoping that you hadn't been suggesting that all Americans (or, at least, the ones that read Wikipedia) care about basketball and none of them care about cricket (because, as I said which you have ignored, viewership stats coming from a certain nation means absolutely nothing in relation to what sport articles get read), but here you say you were indeed asserting that 40% readers of readers being American means more readers care about basketball than cricket... and then go on to say that you don't like the idea of basketball being primarily American. You assert the idea that cricket is more popular than basketball is stupid, despite fan and playing stats saying so.
And, you say you wouldn't have cared at all about the cricket blurb... but you cared enough here to add an off-topic comment that phrased your opinion as fact, and look where we are - I bring this up not to discredit you; I may have been unclear in my first reply about my point being that death blurbs are subjective but such comments like yours was are unhelpful and so we should discourage them or at least be aware of them when assessing !vote arguments in ITNC discussions of death blurbs. But I'm sure you'll agree this thread has proven the point I left implicit (not to draw out the thread, though I will admit there came a point I continued it for this purpose). So, thanks, I think. Kingsif (talk) 05:12, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Of course Im not suggesting that. About Some 30,000 whole people watch or play cricket in the US. Ill let you work out the math compared to the number who watch or play basketball as to why that would lead one to believe that the vast majority of American readers dont care about cricket, while a great deal many more do care about basketball. And please dont put words in my mouth. I said the idea that cricket is more notable is stupid. Also the idea that it is likely more popular among en.WP readers. Given that the majority of those come from countries that have similar sub-1 percent viewership who cares about cricket. nableezy - 05:20, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Skip a few comments back to the one I didn't even know where to start. You've exclusively focused on the first angle, and then come out with assumptions that are disproved by the other two. Cricket makes the top 25 pageviews, basketball doesn't. Wrestling outranks them both. It really doesn't matter where the viewers come from as to what sport articles they read. Like, it really doesn't. (This doesn't excuse you now asserting that most readers of English Wikipedia are from countries that don't care about cricket when you have the stats and know the English-speaking, cricket-loving Commonwealth makes up a lot of readership. You really can't help coming up with bullshit, can you?) Kingsif (talk) 05:44, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

The bullshit remains all yours. Im the one that brought the stats that show that the majority of page views on the English Wikipedia is from non Commonwealth countries. Unlike when you say most, when I say most I mean more than half. Like most of the commonwealth's population speaks English as a second, or even more, as a third language. Or most of the English Wikipedia's readership come from countries with minimal cricket viewership. So, since you cant help but bullshit about what Ive said, and now you cant help but bullshit about stats that I provide. heres the link again. See how just among the top 25 countries that over 56% of the total views is from non commonwealth countries. So kindly stop bullshitting. The wrestling bit is interesting, but not in the way you think. It is interesting in that it shows a rabid fanbase of a minority of viewers can skew page views on any one topic. But the country level stats are a bit harder to skew. But please, for the love of anything you hold holy, read the definition of "most" as you seem to have misused it several times so far. nableezy - 06:17, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Comment The "major errors or omissions" is that this seems to be an incredibly small sample of the deaths (of people with a Wikipedia article) in 2022. How did you choose which people to include in your sample, and which to exclude? The other obvious error is your inclusion of a pageviews column in your table. In the news is not Top 25. Page view popularity does not and should not matter. Possibly the best example of this is that someone who was a head of state and government of their country for 38 years received less than 5% of the pageviews of an an American actor. Chrisclear (talk) 23:25, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

I started by identifying the deaths that got blurbs in 2022. I then looked at other high-profile RDs during the year that might have been considered for blurbing. I then consulted the media to see who they were putting in their summaries of the year's deaths such as the BBC's Notable deaths 2022 to check for major figures that I might have missed. Most major news media have such a summary so it might be interesting to collate them and see who they agree on but that would be quite a bit of work. Such sources, like the views statistic, are evidence. That's what we're supposed to do at Wikipedia – work from evidence and sources rather than just promoting our personal opinions. Andrew🐉(talk) 11:57, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

But another peson may choose another famous people. It is worth to consider only those who were proposed for blurb. Or to mention all who were proposed for RD. Kirill C1 (talk) 16:45, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

I tend to agree with the general consensus here in saying that I don't feel like there is a big issue with ITN at the moment. The idea of a section for deaths is interesting, but I think Deaths in 2023 is sufficient enough for doing what such a section does. I think Ktin's "Trending Topics" section would be interesting though, but that should be a separate discussion. DarkSide830 (talk) 00:29, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Blurbs are not an award we grant to people for being "important enough". They are a way to convey information to readers. If all we have to say about someone is that they died without anything further noteworthy about the death itself, it doesn't need a blurb. That's what RD is for, the routine reporting of deaths that need no further explanation. If a death is unusual or has some other noteworthy aspects or knock-on effects from it (such as an assassination, unusual accidental death, death of a sitting world leader that causes a succession of a new world leader, a large and noteworthy reaction to deaths, such as well-covered memorial services, etc. This list is non-exhaustive, mind you), then it is something a blurb is needed to explain, we should have a blurb for that. But if all we need to say is "so-and-so died", then they don't need a blurb. Otherwise, we're treating a blurb like a "you won at life!" award, and that's not what they are. We should be in the position of deciding what people we just kinda feel like are important enough. If you want to propose a blurb, propose something additional about the death itself that needs note. --Jayron 32 02:58, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Ok then why are Pele and Benedict blurbed on the front page right now? Why was Queen Elizabeth blurbed? nableezy - 03:14, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
Bingo. Curbon7 (talk) 04:40, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
To reply to both, the simple answer is because enough people decided so. Wikipedia is based on collaboration and ITN uses it, too. And even based on Jayron's comment, well, look Queen Elizabeth was a sitting world leader. So, check. A Pope emeritus is technically a sitting world leader. Kinda check. Both of them and Pele have massively-covered memorials. Heck, the level of news coverage just of the queues to see the three of them lying in state could approach ITN-worthy. What Jayron maybe didn't explain too well in the later parts of their comment is the generally-agreed "a death where the death itself is a news story worthy of ITN, can get a blurb". Note 'can', it's still up for debate. And that's simply the case with Pele, Benedict, and Elizabeth, on top of being significant people. Kingsif (talk) 04:54, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

No, pope emeritus is most definitely not a sitting world leader. They are a former world leader. The problem with the enough people decided so answer is the systemic bias. The bias that any number of people exhibit for nearly any blurb for an American. Bill Russell was a civil right icon, awarded his nations highest civilian honor, and the greatest champion in the history of American sport. And the opposes were "no - american". nableezy - 04:57, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Skipping to the important part - this got long-ish. Ok, I'd be interested in how many RDs that are proposed for blurbs are Americans, and how many RDs proposed for blurbs are not Americans, sitting world leaders not included, of course.
I advocated for Betty White on the basis that her influence on early television production, as well as such an enduring career, meant that this being all in one country did not matter. I could not say the same for Barbara Walters, who has equals in many nations and so is not outstanding enough, imo, to meet the 'person was super important' criteria.
In the same way, being (maybe) your nation's best sportsperson means you are among at least a couple hundred people. I doubt that the best sportsperson from ... Mali ... dying gets proposed for a blurb. But Americans often are; the number of !opposes based on locale, then, are kinda just countering the pro-American bias when it comes to proposing RDs for blurbs. The reasons should be more eloquent than what you write, but I'd safely say that a "no - american" !vote can be assumed to be meaning "this blurb was clearly suggested just because they were American, but they have no international notability, their international counterparts would never be proposed for a blurb, so just no".
You also have to remember that !votes are not counted, but judged on the merit of the arguments. That should counter any bias you think is there, because such !votes should be written off. Kingsif (talk) 05:33, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

This was my feeling - there is a sense of pro-American bias that people feel the need to counter, even if the nom is legit. They don't do that for other countries, which results in an anti-American bias in what gets posted. GreatCaesarsGhost 12:32, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

She was probably blurbed on Wikipedia on every language. Kirill C1 (talk) 16:46, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

There were 15 blurbs during the year and I reckon only two cases fit Jayron32's theory. One was the Queen, where there was a huge amount of pomp and ceremony. And the other was Shinzo Abe, who was assassinated. In all the other cases, they were just blurbed for having been important figures in their day at the "top of their field". Andrew🐉(talk) 12:13, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

My concerns in this area tend to centre around the really dumb comments sometimes seen, such as Americans describing cricket as a minor sport (yes, it has happened), and the problem with American sports stars playing sports that are only played in the USA. (Sometimes plus Canada.) Wikipedia and its editing community are global. 95% of the world's population is not American, and they tend to know nothing about American football. It's incredibly hard to make rules that will get a blurb for an American such as Bill Russell, even if he is the world's greatest athlete. How can a non-American objectively judge such a thing? Should they be banned from commenting? HiLo48 (talk) 03:02, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Equally, how could an American objectively judge it? Nobody is expected to be objective, it's which subjective arguments that are more convincing. Kingsif (talk) 03:30, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

How about dumb comments like assuming because one hasn't heard of it in their country, that therefore they must not be famous or notable. I think we should strike those types of comments too. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 13:15, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

The absence of dumb comments doesn't guarantee smart thoughts being behind !votes. —Bagumba (talk) 14:16, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

This is also a good point. How many times have we seen "Oppose - Not notable" and "Support - Notable" be given equal weight in a discussion, regardless of the rationale behind them? Perhaps less is actually more. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 14:35, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Sure, there's crap !votes. Has there been a case where "properly" discounted !votes would have changed the outcome? —Bagumba (talk) 06:01, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

I do apologize for opening that can of worms. I come back after a few days and it appears suddenly I had started some massive and useless debate. Your point stands though, but I don't think it's a big issue given the fact that blurb decisions are not explicitly democratic. I think the Admins do a good job of keeping on top of this. DarkSide830 (talk) 22:24, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

We respect you Andrew, but for anything about ITN that gets questioned, you always refer to viewership stats. As was noted a few times when Vera Lynn didn't get a blurb, that isn't a solid metric. Indeed, nothing really is a metric. RD was introduced when there was too much fighting over what death news stories should get blurbed, and that issue obviously shows up every time we consider a blurb. We debate for a reason - no set of numbers or any kind of 'do they fit in this box' has made deciding which deaths get blurbed easier any time they've been proposed - and that seems to be the best we have. I'm not even sure if your proposal is stats-related or you just wanted to add the table - are you trying to suggest that the selection of blurbs is so unrepresentative of the viewership that your new idea is better? Even though you know stats (or anything) don't relate to blurbworthiness. So, er no change. Kingsif (talk) 03:30, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
Of course there is WP:BIAS. But blurbs are posted based off of consensus. While one might get a few regular ITN contributors to change their perspective, it might be more effective to encourage new participants and possibly broaden the diversity of participants.—Bagumba (talk) 09:04, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
I like this table. I think this is a useful angle to view this information from. Of course the viewership stats are only a shorthand for one of the aspects that matter to us when blurbing a death (it does not relate to the quality of the article, for example). It feels like a fine way to order this list, tho. Either way, my main conclusion from this list is that we have a fairly good variety of blurbed deaths, and we're definitely not blurbing too many in a year, currently. I can definitely tell from the discussion that there's still a lot of disagreement on what deaths and whether deaths alone merit a blurb. Regardless, we can be proud of ourselves for directing our readership to so many high-quality articles about various high-impact individuals :) ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 09:30, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
The easiest thing to do, honestly, would be to get rid of death blurbs except for those where the death (suicide, dying at a young age, etc.) is the main story. I know someone has suggested it before, and I scorned it at the time but only because that doesn't reflect our current policy. But making that change would avoid making ITN, which is already a popularity contest at heart, even more of a popularity contest. --🌈WaltCip-(talk) 13:18, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
You seem to be proposing to strike the "Major figures" criteria from WP:ITNRD. What about the "Death as the main story" part, specifically where it allows for deaths with major stories about memorial services or international reactions? —Bagumba (talk) 13:30, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
The difficulty I find with that is it may often take time for memorial services to take place - I can remember one instance in which a person denied a blurb had a "Death of..." article created about them, but it was too late from ITN's point of view since the item had already rolled past the 7-day cycle. As far as international reactions, that seems like a subjective category too. I could see a situation where someone says "Support blurb, the Sydney Morning Herald and BBC reported on their death, and those are international reactions", and I don't think that's the intent of that phrase. I'd like something a bit more specific about what would meet the criterion for widespread international reactions so that we don't continue to have arguments. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 13:43, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
Yes, the Sydney Morning Herald posting an Associated Press news wire story is probably not the "international reaction" we were expecting. —Bagumba (talk) 13:59, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
As a further nuisance, I remember that both Chris Cornell and Chester Bennington died at a young age of suicide, but although the death was the main story, the issue became confused due to many people arguing they did not merit blurbs because they weren't famous/transformative enough. That crowd ended up winning out, and they just ended up as RDs. So that's another instance where the "major figures" criteria has caused problems. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 17:03, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

I do think such a change would be a shame, as this is an excellent type of article to feature. I look at this table and see a lovely list of a diversity of topics we brought to the forefront. If we had a more detailed recent-deaths section as suggested above too, I suppose that would be alright. I'd almost suggest the alternative of blurbing every recent death that has a GA+ article! But I recognize my feelings on this don't really match other editors here at all.. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 13:32, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
I'd be in favor of blurbing GAs/FAs too. In truth, I think we should be doing that anyway, and originally that was intended by WP:ITNCRIT, but enough people felt differently about that to where ITN's guidelines actually had to be modified to reflect current practice. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 13:45, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Some GAs only undergo a cursory review, or were reviewed years ago before its quality fell. Perhaps less so with FAs, though WP:FAR does exist for a reason too. —Bagumba (talk) 14:04, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
That's true, but I wouldn't automatically question the status of a GAFA when it comes up for nomination in one of our different mechanisms, unless the content of the article clearly shows some red flags. It's a bit like nominating an article for deletion just because it's a recent deaths candidate. While technically doable and would certainly stop the RD process, it's only something you do when it's absolutely necessary. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 14:37, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
It's just due diligence on FA/GAs, and not blindly signing off. —Bagumba (talk) 11:29, 4 January 2023 (UTC)
For what it's worth also, I think the fact that the Americans have an outsize number of RDs but only one death blurb compared to other nations shows that the system is working.--🌈WaltCip-(talk) 13:30, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
My stance:

We do not nor should not use popularity or fame as a serious consideration for posting blurbs. For this reason alone, I can expect some RDs to have more views after their posting than some blurbs.
Besides the normal quality we'd expect at minimum for a RD, a blurb contender should be above and beyond that. Not expecting FA or GA quality, but far better than, say, C-class.
The article should contain a clear section like "Legacy" or "Impact" that describes why the person is being highlighted for a blurb. Not just a list of awards, but actual prose or the like that helps to make it a no-brainer for posting. Having this requirement is a better defined version of things like "major leader" or "transformative figure" as this is the put-up-or-shut-up for those that want a blurb posted. If you can't have a strong Legacy/Impact section, then maybe a blurb is not appropriate. --Masem (t) 13:49, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Also, in that table, if you're making the case about views, you may want to normalize that to views per month or day. Eg the Pope's ratio is going to be far higher than most others, while someone that died early in the year will have a long-tail. It may be better representative. --Masem (t) 13:51, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
There's usually a big spike when someone dies and that's usually quite tight. See the all-time views for Bob Saget, for example.

There are some celebrities who regularly spike and/or have high background traffic and the Queen is a good example. But even in her case, the death spike was quite pronounced and outstanding, as compared with the background traffic. Andrew🐉(talk) 14:47, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
Based on this discussion, I've started compiling some statistics regarding death blurbs in 2022. Between January and April there were 24 nominations were one or more editors suggested or supported a blurb. 20 were males, only 4 were for females. 8 were American (plus 1 Bahamian-American), 2 were Kenyan and the rest were unique. Five blurbs were posted - one each of Australian, Bahamian-American, Iraqi, Japanese (the only female) and Vietnamese. I'll post a full set of statistics and more detail when I've completed the year (probably tomorrow or Thursday). I am intentionally not considering page views. Thryduulf (talk) 16:23, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Update

I've added a couple of columns to the table. They record the current class/grade of the article (which might have been improved as a result of the death) and the level of the subject if they are rated as vital. There don't seem to be any big surprises and the typical scores seem to be grade C and level 5. Note that there are just two FA: Elizabeth II and Bill Russell. One was blurbed and the other wasn't. Andrew🐉(talk) 20:58, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

I think another major factor here that hasn't been mentioned much is whether a person is well known beyond the borders of one country (maybe two countries in the case of ice hockey players). Bill Russell was effectively unknown outside his own country. As an Australian, I think a handful of Australian deaths last year were of people as equally successful in their fields as Russell, but only within Australia. Can such a person ever get a blurb? HiLo48 (talk) 23:18, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

That is demonstrably false. nableezy - 23:29, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

I asked a question. How can a question be false? HiLo48 (talk) 00:03, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

You also said Bill Russell was effectively unknown outside his own country. That is demonstrably false. nableezy - 00:29, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Please demonstrate it. HiLo48 (talk) 00:35, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

The 600k results for his name in Chinese should demonstrate that. Or the fact that his passing was covered in pretty much every national news source out there. Including Australia. nableezy - 01:42, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

I said "effectively". 600,000, compared with the Chinese population, is negligible. The Australian news articles tells us how excited Americans were at the time. No mention at all of any Australian response. HiLo48 (talk) 04:50, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

As opposed to say 6,450 results for one Shane Warne. nableezy - 05:45, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Google results are tailored by Google for YOU, based on what Goggle thinks YOU are interested in. They are of no use whatsoever for discussions like this. HiLo48 (talk) 21:53, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

lol, yes google is aware of my deep and abiding love and understanding of the Chinese language, so much so that they show me 100x the results for somebody you think is "effectively unknown outside of his own country" compared to that monumentally influential person that was mourned across the world. That right there, thats the dumbest thing youve said this week. nableezy - 07:04, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

What's the relevance of Google results? There's no specific or general metric of significance that would be measured by number of Google results. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 14:48, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Its relevant if somebody is claiming that somebody like Bill Russell is basically unknown outside of the US. Now HiLo48 may be ignorant about who he was, but many people outside of the US were not quite that ignorant. nableezy - 19:41, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

You are lying about what I wrote. You can't have much of a case if you feel you need to do that. HiLo48 (talk) 21:51, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes, Im lying by replacing "effectively" with "basically". You know what a synonym is? You said effectively unknown outside of America. And that isnt even the dumbest thing youve written this week! nableezy - 07:03, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

...I think a handful of Australian deaths last year were of people as equally successful in their fields as Russell, but only within Australia. Can such a person ever get a blurb?: WP:ITNC says:

Please do not...Oppose an item solely because the event is only relating to a single country, or failing to relate to one. This applies to a high percentage of the content we post and is generally unproductive.

—Bagumba (talk) 05:58, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

WTF? That was NOT what I was doing. HiLo48 (talk) 06:10, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

You asked if such a person can get a blurb. I merely wrote what ITNC says. —Bagumba (talk) 06:21, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

ITNC says lots of things, most of it, INCLUDING THAT, irrelevant to this discussion. HiLo48 (talk) 09:12, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, to reiterate what HiLo was saying here, I would refer you to the hidden discussion above that's more or less Warne versus Russell. In this case you could argue that Warne is more known outside of his country (as in a higher percentage of those who know of him are not Australian versus Australian) than Russell. This sort of thing clearly impacts a discussion regarding his notability. An Australian person is more likely to know who Warne is, just like an American is more likely to know who Russell is. That impacts how a person is voted on. It's hard to imagine someone gettinga death blurb if they are, for the most part, known only domestically. DarkSide830 (talk) 22:39, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

Absolutely not a scientific metric, but Russell has a Wikipedia article in 55 languages, while Warne has in 38. Howard the Duck (talk) 11:17, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Interesting. I'm certainly not attempting to discount your findings, but I question whether it really means that Bill Russell is popular in Armenia or Turkey, or if cross-Wiki presence could be explained by the USA having emigrants/citizens who are fluent in more languages as compared to Australia. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 17:17, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Absolutely not an estimate based from the scientific method, but the chances of that happening are between 0% and 100%. Howard the Duck (talk) 21:20, 7 January 2023 (UTC)

I'm surprised to see a level 4 "Vital article" (Sidney Poitier) listed here without a blurb. Of course the "Vital article" project is of pretty marginal meaning and certainly controversial (please don't argue about it here), but I'm interested in learning more how his RD discussion played out. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 08:48, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

@Andrew Davidson @Maplestrip: Poitier did, in fact, eventually get a blurb. The discussion was here (archives are searchable from Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates#Archives).—Bagumba (talk) 10:06, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

(edit conflict) You can see the nomination in the history. Checking, I find that Poitier did actually get a blurb. I was misled because he was initially posted as an RD. Andrew🐉(talk) 10:10, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Interesting, good that we caught the error. That does count as one (half) extra US representation, and I think this is another lovely example of an article we brought to the forefront on a person who a lot of people might've missed otherwise. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 11:06, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

I've updated the table above to add the blurb candidates identified by Thrydulf. Most of those add to the long tail but there was one more blurb – the Man of the Hole!

Gilbert Gottfried was the biggest celebrity addition. What's also worth noting is that the scientists and mathematicians tended not to do well -- David Cox, Frank Drake, James Lovelock and Luc Montagnier.

Andrew🐉(talk) 17:44, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Thanks to everyone for putting together this data. I'm one who agrees that the blurbing is a problem -- Betty White but not Barbara Walters or Madeline Albright? The former pope is blurbed for two weeks but Russel wasn't? These are bizarre and biased results, and they reflect the biases in the voters. I'm not sure there is a solution to the problem that doesn't involve replacing the system with one that doesn't involve voting. Like one with objective criteria. So long as we vote on these individually, they will always reflect the biases of the volunteers who show up to vote. Levivich (talk) 17:10, 14 January 2023 (UTC)
There are two easy solutions. One, !votes that are only based on saying this person was famous, or popular, or a household name, or similar terminology, and otherwise not arguing any other way should be ignored. That's the problem we had back when Carrie Fisher was posted as well as Betty White - too many driveby "she was truly beloved, post now!" !votes. Second, I've recommended that blurbs should require the article to have a Legacy, Impact, or similar section that clearly identified why the person was exemplary in their field. If such a section cannot be constructed from reliable sources (including recent obits), then there's almost no reason we should have a blurb. If such a section exists, then that's a least a point to argue from if the blurb should be included or not. Masem (t) 17:22, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

There was a discussion in the past that involved pre-vetting certain individuals for blurbs. I liked that idea but overall reception was cold. That or get rid of death blurbs outside of "death as the main story" blurbs (which really aren't even death blurbs as much as regular blurbs where the story is death). DarkSide830 (talk) 22:55, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

Add ITN/R: The Game Awards

Latest comment: 1 year ago29 comments16 people in discussion

Should The Game Awards be added to WP:ITN/R? 09:12, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

Now that The Game Awards have been posted for 2022, as it had been in ~~2020 and~~ 2021, I think we can now have a serious discussion about adding this to ITN/R. I don't think there is any need to reinvent the wheel, so I'll just copy verbatim DecafPotato's rationale:

1– viewership of The Game Awards is much higher than things like the viewership of the Academy Awards. Last year, The Game Awards had 85 million viewers, [1] while the Academy Awards had only 10 million, [2] representing a nearly 900% increase. 2– the video game industry is indisputably one of, if not the largest entertainment industries (see: GTA V is the most profitable media product ever [3]), so it makes sense that its biggest award would have a recurring item similar to the biggest awards for music and film, and finally, 3– the Game of the Year Award gets plenty of media coverage, enough to satisfy ITN.

~~In my opinion, three successful postings in a row warrants ITN/R regardless of the topic~~, so I support this proposal as nominator. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 19:18, 12 December 2022 (UTC)

Support the proposal per discussion this year. Kirill C1 (talk) 20:57, 12 December 2022 (UTC)
Question I may just have somehow missed it while digging through the ITN archives, but I can't seem to find the discussion/ posting of The Game Awards 2020, and I didn't see anyone link it in the discussion about this year's show over on WP:ITNC. I only found the 2021 posting (which is linked on Talk:The Game Awards 2021). Would someone mind linking the nomination or ITN post? — Gestrid (talk) 21:36, 12 December 2022 (UTC)

You didn't somehow miss it in 2020—it wasn't even nominated. DecafPotato (talk) 00:17, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

Thought so. Just wanted to confirm. — Gestrid (talk) 00:39, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

Support — It wasn't even discussed in 2020, so WaltCip, you might want to fix that. Regardless, I agree with the rationale (it's mine, after all) and think it should be put on ITN/R—two successive postings is good in my book, and there's no reason to believe it won't be posted again in 2023. DecafPotato (talk) 00:21, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
Oppose Story showed considerable levels of opposition; ITNR should be for less controversial stories that are guaranteed to be posted every time. In addition, it receives minimal media coverage outside of gaming-focused publications. BilledMammal (talk) 00:28, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
Support Looking through last and this year's discussion, pretty much the exact same talking points were brought up, and it was posted both times. I suspect the same thing would happen in next year's discussion, too. — Gestrid (talk) 00:39, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
Oppose – Still very easy to imagine for this TV show to decrease in popularity significantly in a few years. Too soon. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 09:09, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
Oppose I am even surprised someone nominated it for ITN.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 11:40, 13 December 2022 (UTC)

Um... Who set this up as an RFC? Was that necessary? 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 12:29, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
Neutral As I stated earlier in the month, I think there should be some level of video game representation in ITN/R due to the proliferation and mainstreaming of the industry; however, I still hold some skepticism of TGA and whether it is the right one to focus on. Curbon7 (talk) 12:37, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
Too soon / oppose. We literally just had a long discussion about this, which isn't even mentioned by the OP. Since then, the award was posted this year through ITN/C, but there was substantial opposition as well, so it's clearly controversial. Consensus in the recent ITNR discussion was that the awards would need to be posted through ITN/C several times before considering them for ITNR - most commenters were asking for 3 or 4 years of consecutive posting. We're now at two, and they were both heavily debated. So try again next year, if it passes ITN/C without a massive debate. Modest Genius ^talk 14:08, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
It was directly mentioned by OP--the rationale is literally the same, because the previous discussion concluded with a "nominate it this year and then reassess", and given it got posted this year, we are reassessing. I don't really see how the last discussion should be treated as a previous discussion that ended in a no, this is a continuation of the discussion as directly requested by the closure of that last discussion.~~ DecafPotato (talk) 03:38, 15 December 2022 (UTC)
Oppose Too soon I think. There has been significant opposition, and I'm not ready to give ITN/R status to something that looks to me rather like a glorified trade show without much independent coverage in the press.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 14:13, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
Not only there is significant independent coverage in multiple reliable sources [3][4][5][6], but there is analysis of awards in highly reliable source [7] Kirill C1 (talk) 19:10, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
IGN is a gaming site and we cannot use Forbes collaborators (which Paul Tassi is) the others are reliable. Masem (t) 20:34, 17 December 2022 (UTC)
Oppose Didn't we just have this discussion. Come back in a few years. If it is posted uncontroversially for several years, then we can start to talk. The prior discussion, closed a few weeks ago, noted it had only been posted once. It was narrowly posted a second time. This does clearly not have the automatic support that ITNR implies. ITNR is for stuff that is basically an automatic posting every year (assuming article quality). I would not call the consensus shown just a few days ago to be "automatic posting". --Jayron 32 18:58, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
See above for the "just had this discussion" response, the previous discussion ended with an agreement from both sides to return to the subject after it was put up at ITNC this year, and now we are here. As for the "ITNR if for stuff with automatic support", no? Plenty of things at ITNR are contested, like sports championships or other award shows (some of which are smaller than the Game Awards both in terms of popularity and industry significance). But those still have majority support, which the Game Awards has (the 2022 nom had 25 !votes to support and 10 to oppose, I wouldn't call that "narrow"). What ITNR means for an item, to me at least, is that "this item has a majority in favor of posting it, and its nature as a recurring event means that new arguments are unlikely to be brought up to change that, so let's just make everyone's lives easier by only focusing on article quality", just as RDs were simplified to focus only on article quality. DecafPotato (talk) 03:49, 15 December 2022 (UTC)
Since you obviously didn't read what I said in the last one, let me quote it to you verbatim. "I think that adding something to ITNR should only follow several (3-4 years) of posting on ITN with minimal opposition. Placing things on ITNR to bypass discussion is putting the cart before the horse." I never said that it should be on ITNR after it passed ITNC this year. What I said was that it needed to pass several years with minimal opposition. This is because ITNR is supposed to be for items for which significance would be functionally unanimous every year. It is NOT supposed to be a means by which to silence opposition. Insofar as significant opposition exists, and it did this year, then this event does not pass that threshold. --Jayron 32 16:23, 15 December 2022 (UTC)
I said "there was agreement" to revisit the nom if/when it was posted this year because that's what the majority of people said + how it was closed. That was hyperbole though, and I didn't mean to imply that you said that or that there was consensus to put it on ITNR after this year--just pointing out that the "just have this discussion" seemed, to me at least, to state that it was being immediately proposed after being rejected, when that discussion had a pretty clear consensus to revisit the item after this year, though with no real majority opinion one way or another. DecafPotato (talk) 20:02, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

Oppose Indeed, ITN/R is like a reverse SNOW: there is no need to have the discussion because the outcome is obvious. Now, that does not apply to many of the items there now because ITN/R is hopelessly broken. But that is the standard. GreatCaesarsGhost 15:53, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

DecafPotato: The standard for ITNR is much higher than a bare majority of support; that kind of support is open to the whims of who shows up that day. ITNR is designed for the stuff for which one could not imagine any serious opposition ever. This clearly does not meet that standard. --Jayron 32 18:15, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
I know many ITNR items a lot of people would've opposed to... Howard the Duck (talk) 22:28, 16 December 2022 (UTC)

Me too, so I don't think Jayron32's assessment is entirely accurate. In fact we did recently have to prune ITN/R of a few items where it wasn't clear that they met the significance standard anymore even if nominated in good faith. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 14:35, 17 December 2022 (UTC)

HtD: You are so close to getting the point. --Jayron 32 03:00, 3 January 2023 (UTC)
Support - I see no reason to wait 3 or 4 years. 2 is fine. Also: it's the Oscars of the video game industry, which is now bigger than Hollywood. Esports is starting to eclipse sports in dollars and audience. It's a 21st century thing. Welcome to the future. Levivich (talk) 17:00, 14 January 2023 (UTC)
Oppose two instances of posting with narrow consensuses is nowhere near a demonstration of suitability for ITNR. Baring occasional exceptions, my standards are two instances posted with (very nearly) unanimous consensuses, 3-4 instances with clear consensuses or 5-6 instances of weaker consensuses. Thryduulf (talk) 21:05, 16 January 2023 (UTC)
Opposecan't believe it was even considered worth an ITN. Learned of the Game Awards from the ITN post, never heard of it before. Look at the google searches. Not a single large news outlet pops up in the first two pages of a google search. Facebook, twitter, instagram...Besides it was just opposed before. Wait until it is in the news in the big outlets and come back.Paradise Chronicle (talk) 00:40, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

Constantine II

Latest comment: 1 year ago52 comments20 people in discussion

Better late?

Today, King Constantine II appeared for the first time as a blurb. His death was quite stale as it happened 7 days ago, and so the blurb appeared below the top blurb about the plane crash in Nepal. Running such a news a week after it happened is not a good look as most readers are now looking for more recent deaths like Gina Lollobrigida. But some must still be interested in the former King as there's an interesting twin peaks effect appearing in the views. But that second peak isn't due to ITN as the blurb has only just been posted. I suspect it's an effect of weekly periodicals like Hello! which follows royalty and is distributed on Mondays. Andrew🐉(talk) 09:53, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

Well, it took a while to get it up to standards, and it is the second-newest blurb. Lollobrigida's article is not ready in any case. Tone 10:15, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

The second peak in views is probably due to his funeral, which was on the 16th. Step hen 10:31, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

Stephen makes a good point. The funeral was attended by European royalty such as Princess Anne and so got good coverage in the news such as the BBC. So, it would be good if the blurb mentioned the funeral and then it would seem more timely. Andrew🐉(talk) 09:35, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

We're an encyclopedia rather than a news website, so I don't believe us putting this on our front page a week after it happened is a "bad look" at all. Quite the opposite, it would show our ability to do quality-control and write a decent encyclopedic article pretty quickly after a major event. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 08:19, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Our practice seems inconsistent as the Yeti plane crash was posted on the day it happened even though all the details, such as the cause, were not yet clear. Mixing up breaking news with more considered entries may be confusing to our readership. Andrew🐉(talk) 10:01, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, that's a fair concern. I wouldn't mind if ITN was a bit slower overall, to prioritize quality and depth, but I recognize and understand the drive to present the news to readers quickly too. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 10:11, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Consensus?

I looked at the discussion for Constantine II and see many opposes for the blurb. On what grounds and under what Wikipedia policies was this blurb posted? I do not see any consensus based on the discussion, and very well reasoned arguments opposing the blurb. Is there any meaning to our policies related to blurbs at all at this point? The more of these we post the more there will be precedent creep that demands posting of increasingly less notable figures on ITN for something that "Recent Deaths" was introduce to handle. Colipon+(Talk) 03:54, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes, there was no consensus to post a blurb; it was certainly mixed, and we should only be posting blurbs when there's clear consensus. This needs to be undone. Masem (t) 04:19, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

This discussion has been archived now. In that, Spencer describes this as a "narrow consensus". I did not enter a !vote but now his funeral is in the news again (see above), I'm content with it appearing as a blurb. Note that the readership of the article is comparable with the top blurb and way ahead of the lower three blurbs which have a tiny readership now. Andrew🐉(talk) 09:44, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

I don't mind that this subject got blurbed, as his article looks nice, describes the death in-depth, and it works for the relatively quiet news month. There's no problem here, but you're right that I don't think this is the type of article we'd usually feature in ITN. At the very least, it feels very encyclopedic of us? :p ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 09:58, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Masem. There should be a clear consensus to post a blurb, with a "narrow" consensus defaulting to no consensus. Should have been posted to RD instead.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 13:53, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

ITN isn't a strictly democratic process and the posting of an item like this with narrow or even no consensus is generally an indicator of poor "Oppose" arguments. There was no rule broken here. DarkSide830 (talk) 14:52, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Comment: At the time I posted, there was approximately 2:1 consensus in favor of support, with 16 users expressing outright support for a blurb (TheCorriynial, TomMasterReal, Precarious Words, Mikedelis, Joe Biden Real 1942, MyriadSims, Estar8806, Kiril Simeonovski, Kirill C1, Maplestrip, Therealscorp1an, Rockstone, the IP, Koltinn, ArionEstar, Rushtheeditor), 10 users opposing for quality but supporting a blurb if improved (Alsor, Tone, Ad Orientem, Darkside830, NorthernFalcon, Anarchyte, Thryduulf, TheBlueSkyClub, Bestagon, GenevieveDEon), with 14 opposes (Muboshgu, Masem, TompaDompa, Black Kite [oppose based on quality without a clear statement regarding a blurb; given less weight after article quality improved], Sandstein, Kicking222, Ghmyrtle, Modest Genius, Nableezy, SoWhy, UnknownTemptation [note that their opposition included a comparison to another article that was actually blurbed], Vida0007 [same as Unknown Temptation, comparison to another article that was blurbed], Pawnkingthree, Nsk92). Article quality was improved late but met ITN standards at the time I evaluated consensus, so I took those statements accordingly in favor of a blurb. Although other admins may feel differently, for me, 2:1 in favor of supporting is consensus for posting an item at ITN, even if narrower than other nominations. Best, Spencer^T•C 15:20, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Support for an RD is not the same as support for a blurb. nableezy - 20:17, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

(I did not directly support a blurb, I suggested another potential blurb target that didn't end up being used. The number is off here) ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 08:36, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

I hold no opinion on this posting. I only request that we should not be pulling down any of our postings once posted unless we have egregious sourcing / BLP violations. As much as the cost of doing so is negligible we should be treating “pull” as a stop-press kind of event. Ktin (talk) 16:33, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

Per Ktin, the whole "I don't like how this vote was decided" isn't really a great reason to remove. If the blurb is factually accurate and the article quality is up-to-snuff, then the rest of this is just sour grapes/nitpicking over hurt feelings. Regardless of how I would have voted had I voted (and if anyone has paid attention to how I vote in nearly ALL RD/Blurb votes, you can probably guess), it's up now. There's no real point in taking it down, it's not hurting anything. --Jayron 32 19:28, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

If a single admin is allowed to invent a consensus then the entire structure of this place is worthless. If something did not have consensus to post and it was posted then it should be removed. nableezy - 20:17, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

What is your criteria to "have consensus"? —Bagumba (talk) 08:56, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

If it helps, we actually have an article on that. HiLo48 (talk) 09:27, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

WP:Consensus is of course more relevant in this discussion. "Decision making and reaching consensus involve an effort to incorporate all editors' legitimate concerns" is I think a key sentence here. I agree with DarkSide above that consensus can be interpreted by the closing administrator, which is what happened here. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 09:40, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

SO, for an admin, consensus means "The admin looked at all of the arguments, weighed them relative to which arguments were strongest, giving credence both to the number of arguments that agreed, but also with those arguments that had the best reasoning in terms of strongest arguments". For things that are close calls, reasonable people may disagree, and in those cases we generally don't reverse the admin that closed it, even if we think that we might have made the "close call" in a different direction. Since this decision could have gone "either way", then there's not any particularly strong reason to undo the initial close. --Jayron 32 13:25, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

While there is a policy regarding consensus, I was interested to know what the editor wanted changed to prevent ITN from being "worthless". —Bagumba (talk) 11:36, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

It's not a vote. If the arguments on one side are clearly stronger than those on the other, that counts for something. (I'm not specifically asserting that in this case - but I am seeing 'consensus' being treated as a soft synonym for 'majority', which it isn't.) GenevieveDEon (talk) 13:13, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

When arguments are mostly subjective, it devolves into a majority vote. —Bagumba (talk) 13:21, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

No, that's not the case at all. Or at least the majority should be crystal clear (like, 20-2 votes in favor). This was very close in numbers which in most other places on WP (like AFD, RFCs, etc.) is taken as a "no consensus" and thus no action should be taken (though posting as RD was still available). If an admin reads a close vote and opts for one direction or the other, that's supervoting for all purposes. Masem (t) 13:33, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Unless they felt that the arguments being made in one particular direction are stronger than in the other; it isn't a supervote if one side makes arguments that are stronger (more logical, better evidence, more based in established PAGs, etc. etc.) than the other side does, the admin is supposed to take that into account. Close numerical are not always no-consensus. --Jayron 32 14:06, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

In my view, there were two choices here for the adjudicating admin - either (1) post the blurb or (2) post the RD. (2) would have been basically uncontroversial to all the "voting" members (i.e. those who supported blurb were not opposed to RD), while (1) was opposed with decent if not overriding arguments by a significant minority. In my opinion (2) would have been the legitimate consensus. Anyway, this is crying over spilled milk at this point, a stale contention to an already stale post. But this type of arbitrariness over blurb vs RD will fan up every time if we don't establish more objective rules or criteria. Colipon+(Talk) 14:10, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes, the problem is that the significance standard on ITN is inherently subjective, per the following line in WP:ITNCRIT: The consensus among those discussing the event is all that is necessary to decide if an event is significant enough for posting. It's difficult to determine which arguments in a significance discussion are "stronger", because ITNCRIT weighs them all equally. Of course, they list guideline principles such as news sources, depth of coverage, frequency of updates and all of that bullshit, but no posting admin is required to weigh these principles when making their decision. And if the essence of arguments on both sides amount to "I think it's significant" vs. "I don't think it's significant", then a posting admin is really left with no choice but to either count heads or supervote. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 14:15, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

They are not required to, but they are allowed to. --Jayron 32 14:23, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Which I believe is the source of nuisance here, in that the consistency of application is not always... consistent. And unless we go to a more objective set of rules, we're going to continue running into grievances like these. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 15:02, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

It's not really a grievance. An article got linked in a slightly different part of the ITN box, located no more than a centimeter or two above the other place where it could have been linked. If there was ever a more unneeded mountain built out of a more inconsequential molehill, I've never seen one. There's far too much text spent debating whether exactly where within a small block of text the link to a recently deceased King of Greece should have been posted... --Jayron 32 15:07, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

It us important because it sets examples that keep coming back up to haunt us when they are done poorly. We already have too many of these (like Carrie Fisher and Betty White) which get driven by popularity

I've suggested multiple times that we can add a somewhat objective requirement that blurbed deaths - outside cases where the manner if death us important like the Ukraine helicopter crash - that there should be a Legal or Impact section that linearly defines why the person was outstanding or a leader in their field. Masem (t) 16:36, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Oh, you don't need to convince me. I've consistently argued, 100% of the time, in every death posting, that a death needs to have something extra to write in a blurb beyond merely that someone died. Blurbable deaths should be something that needs explanation, like an unusual death, or one with wider implications (death of a sitting world leader, assassination, unusual accident, noteworthy responses to the death). A blurb should not be an award we grant to people because they were more valuable to the world than other people, it should be a means to convey information. If we don't need to convey anymore information than that someone died (or other banal facts like their job or age when they died) then RD is better suited to such a task. Had I voted in the discussion, I would have voted for RD only... But that being said, now that the deed is done, there's absolutely no particularly good reason to pull it from the blurb section. The main purpose of ITN is to put quality articles in front of readers, nothing more and nothing less, and both a blurb and RD do that to equal effect. So, even though I would have voted differently, that doesn't mean that I think it is worth changing anything now that it's done. --Jayron 32 16:50, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

A blurb should not be an award we grant to people because they were more valuable to the world than other people... Why not? We already write articles about some people and not other people because they are more valuable -- except we use the word "notable". We do this because we serve the readers, who are interested in reading about some people but not everyone, and not all people equally. So why not give some people a blurb and not others based on the level of reader interest, or if you prefer, based on their "notability" or "value"? Levivich (talk) 17:24, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Because that's too much like cultural gatekeeping; enforcing our view of what should be important enough for "extra recognition" beyond what is the bare minimum necessary to have an article at Wikipedia. Wikipedia's notability requirements are not an award of merit, they are an assessment of available reliable source information one could use to write an article. WP:GNG are only about "Is there enough good source text out there in the world to support a stand-alone article". It is not an award we grant people because we find them more interesting, important, valuable, to us personally. It's merely a standard by which we assess how much information is available about a subject to know if it is worth writing about them. ITN is not supposed to tell everyone what we think is important enough; it's supposed to show people good Wikipedia articles about things they are likely hearing about in the news. --Jayron 32 17:34, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

@Wow - Notability on Wikipedia is definitely not a judgement of how valuable a person or other topic is, and the fact that so many interpret it that way is a problem we continuously need to fight against. Notability on Wikipedia is about if enough other people have taken notice of a thing and produced sufficient sources for us to be able to write about it, not about its inherent worth or value. The misperception that it is about worth or value lends ammunition to spammers, paid editors, and people with a COI who are writing about themselves. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 17:38, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Idk I have the same @Wow reaction. Wikipedia notability is about whether reliable sources write about a subject, and reliable sources write about a subject because the subject is important or interesting, and things that are important or interesting are valuable. We don't write about something because we personally find it valuable, we write about something because the world finds it valuable. Having a Wikipedia article is absolutely a statement of importance, it's a statement that "this topic is important, people write about this topic", and when the topic is a person, well, "this person is important, people write about this person". Coverage in RS is a measure of worth or value. Levivich (talk) 17:48, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

Right, so if you're using notability as your standard for posting on ITN, as you alluded to when you said "So why not give some people a blurb and not others based on the level of reader interest, or if you prefer, based on their "notability" or "value"?" then the notability element has been decided by the existence of the Wikipedia article; that decision was made before ITN ever happened; now with regards to why we don't write blurbs for such people, it was decided many years ago, when the RD section was created, that such blurbs would quickly overwhelm the blurb space with a bunch blurbs that just said "So and so died." which is repetitive and silly, so it was, at that time, decided to avoid that we should just list the deaths in a line at the bottom, which conserves valuable space while still containing functionally the same information. So, yes, notability is certainly how we measure the worth of reporting a recently dead person at ITN; anyone notable enough for an article is notable enough to have their death reported (so long as the article quality is good enough), and we post those deaths in the RD line. Insofar as their may be nothing extra to say, that's sufficient. If we have something extra to say, like "So and so was assassinated and replaced by so and so", then that merits a blurb, because there's something extra to explain about the death. But the primary role of ITN is to direct people to articles, a link in the RD list or a link in a blurb serves that purpose equally as well. --Jayron 32 18:28, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

OK, I'm convinced, sign me up for Team RD Biographies, Blurb Events. Levivich (talk) 19:07, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

I'd be on board with this change too. It's always a morbidly absurd and occasionally degrading exercise to debate whether someone who died is "worthy" of a blurb. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 20:42, 19 January 2023 (UTC)

To paraphrase the once great and powerful Oz in his later life, aye, too sweet, we're taking over. InedibleHulk (talk) 01:23, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

I'll also put myself in this camp. If anyone wants to create a seperate proposal for such I'll make sure to lend my support (I've been thinking of doing so myself when I can create the time to do so). DarkSide830 (talk) 15:58, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

So what do we do where the event is notable and a person in the event dies, such as the Ukraine minister just recently, or way back to Kobe Bryant? eg to take Bryant's death, if Bryant wasn't involved, the accident likely wouldn't have had a blurb, but with Bryant on there, it completely switched the picture. In the case of the Ukraine minister, the accident would still be a blurb (likely) due to the number of civilians killed in it, and that the minister was one of those kills only adds to it.

I'll stress that the problem with death blurbs that are not tied to notable events are due more to percieved popularity, fame, and importance, when their articles lack such information that explain their legacy or impact. Our "major figures" used to talk about "top of their field" or "transformative", and those were very strong metrics that could weed out cases of simple popularity. We need to put those qualities back on the board when deciding blurbs. That may allow more blurbs but should better prevent the mess of cases like Carrie Fisher or Betty White which mainly were driving by "she was famous" first-time postings. Masem (t) 16:36, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

While I above noted that I would agree with abolishing the death blurb principle, the clause for the posting of death blurbs relating to death as the main story is something that can easily be argued for without having to cite the clause that directly classifies it as a death blurb. For example, we burbled Shinzo Abe's assassination more or less under this principle, but even without this clause backing up posting the only real argument against posting about the death of an individual is an argument that such a person's death many not have a long-term impact, which is debatable and could certainly be argued with or without such a clause existing. I certainly agree with your point that we should be more discerning about who gets a death blurb, but could a compromise situation exist in this case. Perhaps we axe death blurbs simply on notability but also make a more concerted effort to expand upon Deaths in 2023, or maybe even have a separate box for deaths? DarkSide830 (talk) 17:59, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

Or at least the majority should be crystal clear (like, 20-2 votes in favor): It does not say that anywhere for ITN, let alone at the WP policy WP:CONSENSUS. —Bagumba (talk) 11:38, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

No, its not written as a P&G that way, but CONSENSUS is written that we should be cautious and close discussions as "no consensus" when questions of whether consensus was achieved are raised. Yes, a 20-2 !vote where the 20 !votes do not cite any reasonable P&G, an admin may overlook that. But on the assumption that all 20 + 2 !votes raise their points against established P&G, it would be very surprising to see that closed any other way than in favor of what the 20 !voted for. But when it is something like 12-10 !votes, under the same logic, that's far different, and the simple majority is usually not accounted for to decide there is consensus. Masem (t) 16:29, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

I think you shot your argument in the foot a bit using 20-2, which is an ultra-high percentage of ITN consensus that I doubt many subscribe to. Curbon7 (talk) 16:40, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

Considering the closer cited a 2:1 ratio, hypothetical 20–2 and 12–10 scenarios are irrelevant. —Bagumba (talk) 16:58, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

I mean, whatever other solution then is there for any blurb that's not a clear consensus (i.e. 10:1 as noted or perhaps somewhere as low as 5:1) nor a clear lack of consensus (presumably anywhere from 2:1 either way, exclusive)? I don't want to act high-and-mighty here or anything, but when it comes to the better portion of blurbs (even including INT/R), there's always going to be people not versed in ITN rules supporting or opposing for reasons that can't be accepted for the sake of the discussion. The last thing we need is to require some high bar in the ratio of supports to opposes to post an event to ITN, because a blurb not getting posted on a "weak consensus" like, say, 3:1 is effectively the same result as not posting at all, which should (with reason) irk those who supported the nom. DarkSide830 (talk) 18:07, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

The last thing we need is to require some high bar in the ratio of supports to opposes to post an event to ITN... We're not bending it just because a regular is unhappy that an outcome was opposite from their preferred outcome.—Bagumba (talk) 08:43, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

Archiving outdated blurbs

Latest comment: 1 year ago20 comments9 people in discussion

Given that the number of blurbs in the ITN section is not fixed (typically ranges from 4 to 6) and that there have recently been complaints that some blurbs have been posted for more than two weeks, do you think we should start archiving outdated blurbs after certain period of time (e.g. 5, 7 or 10 days), i.e. removing them before they roll off?--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 20:40, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

ITN is no stranger to slow seasons, especially if there's a spate of overly strict participants at ITN/C for any extended period of time. Going this route opens up the very real probability that we may have a blank or near-blank ITN template. 🌈WaltCip-(talk) 21:06, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

That’s true even though a minimum number of blurbs could be set. Anyway, how is the number of blurbs determined? Why we sometimes have 4 and other times 6 blurbs?--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 21:37, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

Because the other sections of Main page can have different sizes. With a short TFA, we use a smaller number of ITN blurbs, for example. It is all about balance. Tone 21:46, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

That’s a logical explanation, but very weird at the same time. Thanks.--Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 22:28, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

See also WP:ITNBALANCE. —Bagumba (talk) 01:19, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

I support archiving outdated blurbs because "balance" depends on device, screen resolution, and width which is different for every reader (and doesn't apply at all to mobile readers), and because it would discourage spates of overly strict participation at ITN/C. Levivich (talk) 22:39, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

It's perhaps overly optimistic that archiving old blurbs and creating whitespace will shame those with strict ITN blurb criteria, when the status quo of leaving stale content posted has not. —Bagumba (talk) 01:15, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

...because "balance"...doesn't apply at all to mobile readers...: It's relevant to tablets, even if not for phones. —Bagumba (talk) 01:22, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

It applies to phones cause you can force the real site in Android (and probably something similar for Apple) by touching symbol near address bar then Desktop site [] and that's readable zoomed out in at least some phones. If you have a 1440p phone and good eyes you can even habitually use the phone from 10 inches and occasionally from 4 inches (the best you can do at moderate myopia) and make the text as small as you can easily read without finger zooming and it looks really cool and doesn't have the excessive scrolling and text size of m. and even en.wiki but no force desktop site. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 02:05, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes, we were referring to the mobile web view, and not mobiles using desktop view nor mobiles using an app. —Bagumba (talk) 03:20, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

Tbh when I wrote 'mobile' I really meant 'anyone using the Minerva skin'. Levivich (talk) 16:16, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

Well, there definitely does seem to be a glut of very strict ITN editors. I find it absurd that we haven't posted that Kyiv helicopter crash yet, and that Jacinda Ardern's resignation waited so long to be posted that we ended up using a picture of her successor. The Yeti Airlines crash nomination attracted several people saying they didn't think the death toll was very significant - it's right that there's no minimum deaths criterion, but it was a toll which would definitely be regarded as significant if it happened in a Western nation. Wikipedia's systemic bias really manifests itself very strongly at ITN/C - and when topics about non-Western countries are proposed, there's often at least one established editor showing up to say they haven't heard of the topic, or don't think it's prominent. You know what? This an encyclopedia - you can use it to find out about these things! GenevieveDEon (talk) 08:58, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

It's often actually the contrary: anytime an American event gets nominated, there are at least a few people who oppose on the ground of it being Americo-centric. Curbon7 (talk) 20:30, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

For the record, I'm not saying whether the Americo-centric point is justified or not, I'm just pointing out that it happens. Curbon7 (talk) 20:32, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

I get that. And I'm not saying we don't get complaints (justified or not) about posting US news. We certainly do! But we also get, for example, people positing largely novel theories of government to try and argue that the election of the Speaker of the House is already ITN/R. That's some powerful American exceptionalism right there. But I'm not really talking primarily about the content of the discussions, but about their product. It really doesn't matter if the discussion page is awash with anti-American claptrap, if the actual news feed ends up still dominated by news from Anglophone countries. And the attitude to elections in Antigua, plane crashes in Nepal, blizzards in Afghanistan, and so on frequently does reflect pro-Western biases, and is articulated not only in skewed opinions, but in experienced editors stalling the process so that those items become stale and never get posted. Far from combating systemic bias, a lot of our bureaucratic procedures (introduced for good reasons, I know) end up furthering it. To return to the Jacinda Ardern case: the mainstream news sites featured her face and her words prominently for days, but we sat on our hands until a white man showed up, and now her replacement has graced the homepage for almost a week, without any sign of her. We can and should do better than this. GenevieveDEon (talk) 12:35, 26 January 2023 (UTC)

After the recent Vector 2022 update and the general mess on formatting (pardon my bluntness here) — I do not believe WP:BALANCE should be an issue that drives us to add / remove blurbs. Ktin (talk) 01:36, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

Ouch WP:BALANCE is not the right *balance* I was referring to. I am referring to main page balance that is used to justify adding / removing blurbs from the bottom of the ITN box. Ktin (talk) 01:38, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

WP:ITNBALANCE! Curbon7 (talk) 20:31, 21 January 2023 (UTC)

Ahh! Thanks @Curbon7 Ktin (talk) 22:33, 21 January 2023 (UTC)