Hey guys So, as you know, we have issues with how new pages are treated on Wikipedia. A lot of the pages created by new editors simply aren't very good; this is bad for the new editors, because their pages get deleted, and bad for the new page patrollers who then have to wade through a tide of junk. It’s also contributing to page patrollers being overworked. Recently, Engineering has been working on two projects that we hope will hopefully improve the situation: Page Triage,[1] which is aimed at making patrolling easier, and the Landing System:[2] a better way for new editors to create articles. With these project we hope to both reduce the burden on patrollers by making it easier to patrol, and by ensuring the articles that are created are of higher quality. The first of the two Engineering is working on, partly because it lends itself to being broken out into smaller pieces of work, is the Landing System. Currently, when a registered newbie clicks on a redlink, they get automatically taken to an edit page where they can create the article, but without any context as to what is actually happening. With the proposed system, instead of seeing a blank edit window devoid of context, they'll see a new page that gives them various options.[3] They can create an article there, go through the article wizard, or go back to wherever they were before if they didn't mean to end up at that URL. If a new editor tries to create the article, they'll be informed that they need a familiarity with policy, an absence of a COI and several references (amongst other things) before the tool recommends they create it.[4] If they don't have those things, they'll be directed to the Article Creation Wizard. This is an experiment. Our hypothesis is that this could help increase the quality of new articles and reduce patrollers’ workload, while making the process more welcoming at the same time. What our devs would really love is if people could provide feedback on what they've put together so far. There is an early prototype at http://ee-prototype.wmflabs.org/ <http://ee-prototype.wmflabs.org/;> , and I’d encourage everyone to test it out. The tool is currently targeted at logged in users since an account is required for creating a pge, so you have to be logged in to see it. I’ve created a test account (username “editor”, password “mailing list”) for people to work with. Then just go to something like http://ee-prototype.wmflabs.org/wiki/Special:ArticleCreationLanding/test, and take a look at what you’re presented with. We know that the prototype server is fairly slow (sorry about that!) and the prototype could be a bit buggy, but if you have suggestions as to how we should improve the tool itself, you can send them to me at okeyes(a)wikimedia.org, or to http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Article_Creation_Workflow/Landing_System , where the devs are watching closely :). Thanks! -- Oliver Keyes Community Liaison, Product Development Wikimedia Foundation [1] http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/New_Page_Triage [2] http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Article_Creation_Workflow/Landing_System _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

Hey guys So, as you know, we have issues with how new pages are treated on Wikipedia. A lot of the pages created by new editors simply aren't very good; this is bad for the new editors, because their pages get deleted, and bad for the new page patrollers who then have to wade through a tide of junk. It’s also contributing to page patrollers being overworked. Recently, Engineering has been working on two projects that we hope will hopefully improve the situation: Page Triage,[1] which is aimed at making patrolling easier, and the Landing System:[2] a better way for new editors to create articles. With these project we hope to both reduce the burden on patrollers by making it easier to patrol, and by ensuring the articles that are created are of higher quality. The first of the two Engineering is working on, partly because it lends itself to being broken out into smaller pieces of work, is the Landing System. Currently, when a registered newbie clicks on a redlink, they get automatically taken to an edit page where they can create the article, but without any context as to what is actually happening. With the proposed system, instead of seeing a blank edit window devoid of context, they'll see a new page that gives them various options.[3] They can create an article there, go through the article wizard, or go back to wherever they were before if they didn't mean to end up at that URL. If a new editor tries to create the article, they'll be informed that they need a familiarity with policy, an absence of a COI and several references (amongst other things) before the tool recommends they create it.[4] If they don't have those things, they'll be directed to the Article Creation Wizard. This is an experiment. Our hypothesis is that this could help increase the quality of new articles and reduce patrollers’ workload, while making the process more welcoming at the same time. What our devs would really love is if people could provide feedback on what they've put together so far. There is an early prototype at http://ee-prototype.wmflabs.org/<http://ee-prototype.wmflabs.org/;> , and I’d encourage everyone to test it out. The tool is currently targeted at logged in users since an account is required for creating a pge, so you have to be logged in to see it. I’ve created a test account (username “editor”, password “mailing list”) for people to work with. Then just go to something like http://ee-prototype.wmflabs.org/wiki/Special:ArticleCreationLanding/test, and take a look at what you’re presented with. We know that the prototype server is fairly slow (sorry about that!) and the prototype could be a bit buggy, but if you have suggestions as to how we should improve the tool itself, you can send them to me at okeyes(a)wikimedia.org, or to http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Article_Creation_Workflow/Landing_System, where the devs are watching closely :). Thanks!