New featured picture: a high-quality copy of a large steel engraving by the 18th-century English engraver William Woollett, The Battle at La Hogue, after a painting by Benjamin West (1781). The image probably shows the events of 24 May 1692, when the British sailors rowed in and torched French ships.
3,000th featured article
On 18 August, the English Wikipedia reached a milestone with the promotion of its 3,000th article to Featured article (FA) status. These 3,000 articles represent the best 0.09% of articles on Wikipedia—about one in every 1,120 articles. FAC Delegate User:SandyGeorgia said, "Congratulations to all the nominators and reviewers who contributed to reaching the 3,000 FA milestone on Wiki! I also note that FAC has reached a two-year high on monthly promotions, in spite of increasing standards, and congratulate all of the dedicated contributors – both writers and reviewers. We can always use more reviewers (without reviewers, we don't have FAs): see Reviewers achieving excellence for ways anyone can help out".
The Featured article process (FAC) was initiated in June 2003 as "Brilliant prose"; we reached 500 FAs in February 2005 (see Signpost coverage); the 1,000th FA was promoted in June 2006 (Signpost coverage); the 2,000th was reached just under two years later (Signpost coverage). The deterioration over time of individual FAs and rising standards for promotion have meant that many early articles have been demoted; the number of FAs (promotions less demotions) has risen at an average rate of 34 articles a month from August 2008 to July 2010. In the first half of this year, 270 articles were promoted, and 70 were demoted, a rise of 200 articles or about 33 articles monthly.
Dabomb87 (nom), from Texas, has some 60,000 edits to his name over his three years with us. He has been described as "doing anything he can to help out, ... with careful and thorough conscientiousness". He is a featured list director and has a prolific record of reviewing featured content, good articles, and DYK nominations.
Nikkimaria (nom), a Canadian Wikipedian since 2005, has built up a strong record in content creation and reviewing, and has done valuable work at NewPages and RecentChanges. She has particular interests in English, history, and music, and speaks French.
WOSlinker (nom) has focused mainly on working on templates—in particular the use of {{editprotected}}—and editing in fields as diverse as World of Spectrum (hence the user name), motorsports, and broadcasting. He nominated for an RfA after seeing last week's Signpost story on the precipitous decline in active admins over the past few years.
Amatulic (nom) also nominated after seeing last week's Signpost article. Amatulic—an American scientist with an MBA in addition to an undergraduate degree in physics—has worked as an engineer for the past 25 years, mostly in the field of stealth technology; he has logged in almost every day since joining in 2006. He is experienced in dealing with user-level maintenance such as vandalism, spam, and article deletion, and participates regularly in dispute resolution on WP:Third opinion.
Airplaneman (nom) has experience in the project's administration, discussions, and content work (airplanes, classical music, technology, science, and literature). He participates in the adopt-a-user scheme and is a member of the Welcoming committee.
New featured articles
Wandsworth Bridge, joining two parts of London across the Thames.Five articles were promoted to featured status:
Banksia scabrella (nom), commonly known as the "Burma Road Banksia", a species of woody shrub found in Western Australia (nominated by Casliber).
Seorsumuscardinus (nom), a genus of fossil dormouse from almost 20 million years ago, found in central and eastern Europe (Ucucha).
"The Body" (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) (nom), "not your typical sci-fi/fantasy episode", said one of the nominators. A commentator was also quoted: "Any sneerer of Buffy in particular or genre work should simply be sat down in front of a television and told to shut up for three-quarters of an hour while they are shown 'The Body'" (Moni3 and Courcelles).
Yorkshire captaincy affair of 1927 (nom), a dreadful squabble about the relationship between professionals and amateurs in English cricket, with undertones of class warfare (Sarastro1).
Wandsworth Bridge (nom), the story of a bridge that crosses the Thames, among the last two in London privately built for toll revenue. It was rebuilt and opened as a free bridge under public ownership in 1940, "a distinctly unlovely piece of wartime functionalist design which replaced an equally unlovely piece of 19th-century cost-cutting design", says nominator Iridescent. (picture at right)
Choice of the week.Southpark is an FA veteran at the German Wikipedia, with many "Exzellente Artikels" under his belt. He has served on the jury of de.WP's "writing contest" three times, and is fluent in English. The Signpost asked him to select the best of the week's promotions on the English Wikipedia: "I enjoyed reading all of the articles and now have a new sightseeing destination for my next London trip. Maybe I'll even give cricket a second chance. I chose "The Body" (Buffy the Vampire Slayer). I especially like that this is an article that could never ever be written on the German Wikipedia. This in-depth treatment of a single television episode shows the special qualities of en.wp in an outstanding manner. It provides aesthetic and cultural background for a phenomenom that I hardly knew anything about except its mere existence. The article avoids fandom and insider-references without being overly technical or even boring. It tells the story of this special episode from several noteworthy angles. Thereby it communicates the emotional impact this episode has on its viewers (and producers) as well as it gives a detailed account of its production. I feel as much informed as I feel entertained." Southpark's blog on the judgment.
Pulse of the Earth album cover for the ten tracks that are now featured soundsA single-page print of the Rescript that Japanese emperor Hirohito read on radio at the end of World War II. This broadcast is now a featured sound, the "Jewel Voice Broadcast"
One stand-alone sound-file and a set of ten files were promoted:
Pulse of the Earth (nom), in what might be a first for Wikimedia, a whole album of a notable group comprising 10 tracks, all at Commons. Nominator J Milburn says, "Hungry Lucy has previously released a number of their works under CC licenses, though not CC licenses that count as "free" under Wikipedia's policies. I contacted the band, asking if they'd be willing to release images/songs under a freer license, and they let me know that (contrary to what it said on archive.org) their latest album, as well as all the images associated with it, were released under cc-by-sa-3.0." The Signpost thanks the band for its generosity. (album cover and sound file for Track 1 at right)
The "Jewel Voice Broadcast" (nom), the momentous radio broadcast at noon on 15 August 1945 in which Japanese emperor Hirohito read out the Imperial Rescript on the Termination of the War, announcing that the Japanese government had accepted the Potsdam Declaration demanding the unconditional surrender of the Japanese military. A translation is provided here (nominator Adam Cuerden). (picture at right)
1976 Winter Olympics medal table (nom), the count of medals won by participating IOCs at the 1976 Winter Olympics, held in Innsbruck, Austria. The Soviet Union won the most overall medals (27) and gold medals (13) (Parutakupiu).
The World's 25 Most Endangered Primates (nom), nominated by Visionholder, a list of highly endangered primate species compiled by the IUCN/SSC PSG. Current endangered species include the Golden-headed Langur, of which there are only 60–70 remaining, and the Sumatran Orangutan (picture at right).
Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock Performance (nom), awarded for quality performances in the hard rock music genre. Recent winners included "War Machine" by Australian band AC/DC and "Wax Simulacra" by American band The Mars Volta (Another Believer).
Grammy Award for Best Rock Album (nom) given for quality albums in the rock music genre. The American band Foo Fighters has had three of their albums win the award: There Is Nothing Left to Lose, One by One and Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace (Another Believer).
Choice of the week. We asked FL nominator and reviewer Goodraise for his favorite: "It was an easy choice. The World's 25 Most Endangered Primates not only stands out for its well-written prose, but for its visual appeal, not to mention the rarity of biology lists with featured status. I particularly enjoyed reading the list because it surprised me. I wasn't aware that so many of our relatives live on the brink of extinction." (picture at right)
Oryzomys, nom, with six featured articles, one featured list and five good articles.
New featured pictures
The Whirlpool Galaxy (left, red spiral arms), one of the most famous galaxies in the sky, interacts with its neighbour, the dwarf galaxyNGC 5195 (right). Astoundingly, even though 23 million light years away, they can sometimes be seen with binoculars.Calvin Borel, the celebrated American jockey in thoroughbred horse racing, pictured in 2007Nine images were promoted. Each can be viewed in medium size by clicking on "nom".
Australian blenny (nom), a small marine fish, reddish-brown with a white ventral side, which inhabits the shallow marine waters of the tropics. They are often found along the Great Barrier Reef and Coral Sea of Australia (created by Nick Hobgood). (picture below)
Elegant sunburst lichen (nom), a lichen here growing on exposed sandstone. It is used in the rock face-dating method known as lichenometry. After discussion of colour variation and brightness, a third version was promoted (Jason Hollinger).
The dynamic sun (nom), a multi-wavelength extreme ultraviolet snapshot of the recent eruption and tsunami on the sun. Earth's magnetic field is still reverberating from the solar flare impact on 3 August, which sparked auroras as far south as Wisconsin and Iowa. Reviewer Lucas Brown said "Wow. Just ... wow" (NASA/SDO/AIA, edited by Hive001).
Calvin Borel (nom), an American jockey in thoroughbred horse racing. Borel rode the victorious mount in the 2007, 2009, and 2010 Kentucky Derbies. Reviewer Raeky said "A wonderful capture done at just the right moment, his facial expression really shows character" (created by Joe Schneid). (picture at right)
Choice of the week.Jfitch, a regular reviewer and nominator at featured picture candidates, told The Signpost, "For me this week there was one nomination that really stood out over the rest. The Australian blenny has such quality and detail, which is made even more impressive when the fact that it is an underwater photograph is taken into account. The technical difficulties in achieving a shot like this are extremely difficult, and being able to capture the fish in such an elegant way really made this the only nomination that I could choose as my Choice of the week." (picture below)
Discuss this story
Wow, interesting choice of editor for the FA choice of the week (from de?). I like it. Way to think outside the box! Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 18:02, 31 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Readers should know about WP:FCDW/3000. ResMar 18:41, 31 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I too would like to congratulate everyone involved in creating and improving everything mentioned on this page. And celebrate the fact of 3,000 FAs. Hooray for us! --bodnotbod (talk) 00:56, 1 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
congrats
Congrats to all on the 3,000th FA; and a note to say that I really like the new style of the Features & Admins section, especially the brief bios of the new admins and the "pick of the week." Very nice! And Resmar, don't take editing personally -- the Signpost runs as a newspaper, which means material isn't duplicated from week to week and the editor in chief's job is to help ensure this and make sure the whole issue is coherent. Bottom line, they may choose not to include things or rewrite them. -- phoebe / (talk to me) 05:08, 1 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Hungry Lucy