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etiquette that I had no idea of for my first nomination - it's ok to explicitly ask someone else to come review your FAC! My third nomination languished for weeks - so I went and asked some folks on their talk pages, and a bunch of them came and reviewed the article! Not everyone will say yes, of course. Phrasing your request neutrally (and without any hint of quid pro quo) is also important. But I think many nominators are unaware that the best option, if no one is showing up to review, is to go ask some people! Prior reviewers of any GAs or DYKs you've written are a good place to start. â
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research for me. The other one was from a more hard-nosed reviewer, but I came back with a citation to a respected dictionary supporting my usage and heard no more about it. I also found that "I like my way better, but if you feel strongly about this, I'll be happy to make the change" is useful; it lets you express your opinion while showing that you're open to input. Pissing off your reviewer isn't going to help get you to LGTM. Or, as I recently read in another context, "Since you have asked for the review, I encourage you to graciously accept more suggestions."
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interested in their article being promoted whereas reviewers are interesting upholding the process and the criteria. It can be frustrating for both sometimes, especially with less-experienced nominators, because the reviewer will be seeing flaws that they've seen many times in many articles ("haven't people learnt by now!") but are brand new to the nominator. I hope you enjoyed the FAC process, Roy, and that you'll bring more articles through it. I'll try to offer a review when I get chance!
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250:. There's much in common (good and bad) and my experiences with other review processes certainly helped me navigate FAC. If you recognize yourself in anything I've written, please don't take offense. I really appreciate all the work my reviewers put into helping me and any of my complaints are presented entirely with the desire to provide constructive feedback to the process.
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I an sorry you received an email saying your review "was unwelcome and should stay away": that is completely unacceptable. The whole FAC process depends on the kindness of others to give up their limited time to review articles, and hearing that someone was trying to force you away is problematic. I
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Lastly: Please, reviewers, make your reviews actionable, and make them understandable. I had several reviews that left me scratching my head trying to figure out what the reviewer wanted. Leading questions are a great face-to-face teaching technique. On wiki, not so much. And some of the comments
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First: I took to heart the advice I got that the best way to entice other people to review your article is to do some reviews yourself. I was shocked when I got an email from somebody telling me (in rather pointed language) that my review of their article was unwelcome and I should stay away. I'll
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I got seemed more like crossword puzzle clues than anything else. When I'm doing a crossword, the joy of finally understanding the hidden meaning of the clue is what I'm looking for. When I'm having my work reviewed, what I really want is for the reviewer to tell me what's wrong and how to fix it.
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One thing that totally caught me by surprise was needing to write a nomination statement. This is a short introduction to your article which is intended to attract reviewers to doing a review. I didn't know I had to write one until I was in the middle of the submission process, and was prompted to
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to GA status in hopes of making it an FA. To be honest, doing all the research and making sure that you have enough details but not too much is really difficult, but I think that having high-quality articles about U.S. First Ladies is a goal worth striving for. I am very much looking forward to the
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an attack against the nominator. I would rather have a well-reasoned oppose than a cursory support, since one could at least use the opposer's feedback to fix the article and potentially flip them into the support column. If someone were to support without actually believing that the article should
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Second: Please, reviewers, try to set reasonable expectations. It does nobody any good to say, "I'll finish this tomorrow" and then not finish it tomorrow. It's really no fun to be in the position of having to figure out if enough days have gone past tomorrow that it's time to bug your reviewer.
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compares to other review processes (on-wiki and in real life), try to take some of the mystery out of it, and give some suggestions for what you can do to make things go smoother on your own first submission. Of course, I would be remiss if I didn't take advantage of this opportunity to take a few
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This one is critical: respond to all reviews promptly. It does a few things. It shows the reviewer that you're engaged. It also throws things back into their court; it may not be good to piss off your reviewer, but a little guilt-trip never hurts :-) The review is going to take longer than you
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If you decide to push back, go in armed with evidence. I had two specific comments about diction/grammar. On one, my response was basically, "Yeah, whatev, I'll let the grammar freaks worry about that". I think I only got away with that because that particular reviewer was a softie, and did the
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In my experience, everyone (barring the odd exception) at FAC is there because they want to see the best-quality articles promoted. The source of conflict is that nominators, who have worked hard on their article and believe them to be near-flawless (otherwise they wouldn't be nominating it), are
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FAC can be nitpicky for sure, but each time I've been through it I know the article has ended up in a much better place than it started. I agree with the author that promptness avails the nominator well, and that purely cosmetic/subjective battles aren't worth fighting. I'd also note one piece of
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Don't fight with your reviewers, or at least reserve your pushback for important stuff. I made a ton of minor changes that I thought were silly or just plain wrong, but weren't worth arguing about. I'm sure in some cases the reviewer was actually right. And I'm sure there were also cases where
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I would agree with SchroCat above. FAC is only as good as the reviewers who show up, and hostility towards people taking time out of their day to improve articles hurts the entire process. Article quality already suffers in my opinion from people being afraid of opposing on quality concerns.
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enter it. I made something up on the spot. I don't know how much difference my poor nomination statement made, but having a good one is probably better than having a poor one. So before you nominate, read the various nomination statements at WP:FAC and think about your
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be promoted to FAC, it would be bad both for the nominator and for the article. Driving opposing reviewers away just turns the FAC process into "a politicized good ol' boys' club", as one editor recently described it, and it reflects poorly on the process. â
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this is also true if you are putting the article up for a pre-FAC peer review. If your article is within the remit of an active wikiproject, you can also leave a notification on the project's talkpage as well as notifying individual editors
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I wholeheartedly agree. That was just something I saw in an unrelated discussion about topicons; if people think FAC is a cliquish process, that will certainly make them distrust the entire concept of featured articles. â
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The
Featured Article process has a well-deserved reputation for being a difficult slog. This two-parter is an exploration of that process from the viewpoint of a first-time nominator. We'll look at how
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727:, best of luck on improving Ida Saxton McKinley to GA/FA status. If you're going for a GAN or FAC, you may want to request feedback from other editors who contribute in the topic area. For example, @
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which turned out to be a wild ride; I'm writing this retrospective of my experience for the cathartic value and in the hope it might help those who follow me into the FA maelstrom.
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has written numerous GAs/FAs on U.S. first ladies, so it may be a good idea to ask if he has any advice (he may not, but it's not a bad idea to try). â
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File:A good send off,-go!- Goldsmith Maid, American Girl, Lucy and Henry, trotting at
Fleetwood Park, Morrisania, N.Y. July 9th 1872 LCCN2001700234.jpg
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shows a lot of regular reviewers who it's good to ask. Not all will be able to help, obviously, but enough to help your review get some traction. -
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hope it never happens to you again, but if it does (or if it happens to anyone who reads this), please post the details
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The long road of a featured article candidate: The first of two installments, regarding a process of many installments.
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want it to; any delay you add shows up directly on the bottom line, so do what you can on your end to keep it moving.
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I need to mention a couple of things that made the process more difficult for me than it should have been.
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582:"a politicized good ol' boys' club" smacks of bad faith and a sentiment I would roundly reject. We have a
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This is incredibly helpful in demystifying the process. Thank you for such a clearly and lively report!
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they were wrong, but at some point your goal needs to be to get through the review and collect your
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The reviews you get at WP:PR and WP:FAM will be similar to the ones you get at
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and many of those come back with their second or third FACs after that. -
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says, "first-time nominators at WP:FAC are not required to use it".
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My first mistake was not availing myself of a pre-FAC peer review at
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and of so little value I decided not to bother again. Looking at
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it's ok to explicitly ask someone else to come review your FAC!
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The starting line for an FA candidate. Watch for the finish on
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that's a good point, I'll mention that in Part 2. And, @
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leave it anonymous, but really? Whatever happened to
503:If your comment has not appeared here, you can try
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521:Knowledge (XXG) talk:Featured article candidates
227:under my belt, I decided it was time to give
91:The long road of a featured article candidate
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838:Knowledge (XXG) Signpost archives 2024-01
782:Make sure we cover what matters to you â
18:Knowledge (XXG):Knowledge (XXG) Signpost
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318:stamp, so pick your battles carefully.
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223:In August 2023, with about a dozen
220:jabs at things that were annoying.
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275:featured articles mentoring (FAM)
273:You want a mentor. Ignore where
237:featured article candidate (FAC)
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499:add the page to your watchlist
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268:the current FAC peer reviews
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286:featured article candidate
242:I'm new to FA, but not to
555:Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs
316:"looks good to me" (LGTM)
755:Penny for your thoughts?
330:Criticism of the process
233:Fleetwood Park Racetrack
709:Caeciliusinhorto-public
290:there's a clock running
496:. To follow comments,
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685:the nominations page
492:from this article's
296:Nomination statement
669:Jane Irwin Harrison
624:Ida Saxton McKinley
785:leave a suggestion
627:next installment.
483:Discuss this story
448:WikiProject report
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45:â Back to Contents
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507:purging the cache
428:Technology report
50:View Latest Issue
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418:From the editor
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405:10 January 2024
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443:In the media
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411:all comments
384:"In focus" â
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360:The Signpost
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114:PDF download
71:John Cameron
820:Suggestions
749:HJÂ Mitchell
490:transcluded
254:Peer review
248:code review
244:peer review
164:X (Twitter)
733:Epicgenius
661:Ganesha811
647:Ganesha811
603:Epicgenius
570:Epicgenius
376:"In focus"
279:Just do it
210:January 14
102:Share this
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463:Crossword
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689:SchroCat
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630:â¤History
588:SchroCat
538:SchroCat
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438:In focus
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