[WikiEN-l] Lock new article creation for three months

[Rich Holton]

Erik Moeller wrote:
> On 3/31/07, Phil Sandifer <Snowspinner at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> Why don't we lock new article creation in the main namespace entirely
>> for three months? Or six months? Demand that people fix existing
>> articles.
> 
> Because things happen every day that deserve to be documented, and
> there are always people who want to do so. Don't force them to try to
> do what you want.
> 
> There are much softer solutions to get people's attention.  For example:
> 
> A simple notice:
> 
> "We have 1,715,464 articles in English. Why not bring an existing one
> up to [[featured article status]]?"
> 
> on the new article creation page.
> 
> A contest announced through the site notice for registered users.
> 
> A "how to make Wikipedia better today" newsletter
> 
> Making an "Improvement of the month" part of the Main Page for
> readers, which would also raise awareness of what Wikipedia
> represents.
> 
> Organizing face-to-face meetups with a focus on actual research & work
> -- perhaps by making them focused on topics, or WikiProjects.
> 
> E-mail newsletters of the "how you can help Wikipedia today" type.
> Real-time collaborations with Gobby. Topic-oriented mailing lists and
> IRC channels.
> 
> Be creative. Locking article creation is not.

Trying to "be creative":

How about locking article creation for everyone one day a week? Or one 
day in 5? or 10?

Keeping up with current events becomes much less of an issue. It 
resembles the sort of routine that many people are familiar with (where, 
for example, they do not work on weekends). And it would allow for some 
time to "catch up".

Of course, it would not have the immediate degree of impact that locking 
page creation for 3 months would have--but that includes both desirable 
and undesirable impact.

-Rich