Hello, Icebob99, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few links to pages you might find helpful:
You may also want to take the Wikipedia Adventure, an interactive tour that will help you learn the basics of editing Wikipedia. You can visit The Teahouse to ask questions or seek help.
Hi Icebob99! We're so happy you wanted to play to learn, as a friendly and fun way to get into our community and mission. I think these links might be helpful to you as you get started.
Hello, I'm ReferenceBot. I have automatically detected that some edits performed by you may have introduced errors in referencing. They are as follows:
Hi. I reverted your edits at Wikipedia:Advice for RfA candidates. Please read WP:NOTVOTE. Wikipedia operates by consensus but admins that close discussions (RfA, AfD, etc.) weigh the arguments made and can decide that the correct consensus is more than just a matter of numbers. Although I'm sure you thought you were catching actual typos, I'd caution you against making any changes to content in the Wikipedia namespace. Policies, guidelines, and essays were written by editors with far more experience and their subtleties may elude you. Chris Troutman (talk)14:54, 3 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
FYI, the others were included in an AfD a while back. It was procedurally closed as keep for being too large and unworkable. So that's not the answer. I PRODed the other EuroBasket ones since they're basically the same and I or someone else can deal with the rest later. Smartyllama (talk) 13:58, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The PRODs were contested by the page creator. I can try to put a combined AfD together later, or you can if you want. It will take a while since there are multiple EuroBasket (and women's EuroBasket) articles to nominate and they all have to go to the same AfD, so I'll need some more time than I have right now unless you want to. However, I would strongly advise against placing different sports in the same AfD. Men's and women's of the same sport is fine, but not different sports like hockey since that's what did the first AfD in. Smartyllama (talk) 16:20, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I have never created an AfD before, so I think I'm going to leave this to you while I look for a regular article for a good first one. Let me know when you start it. Icebob99 (talk) 16:26, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Your recent article submission to Articles for Creation has been reviewed! Unfortunately, it has not been accepted at this time. The reason left by TheMagnificentist was:
This submission's references do not adequately show the subject's notability. Wikipedia requires significant coverage about the subject in reliable sources that are independent of the subject—see the general guideline on notability and the golden rule. Please improve the submission's referencing (see Wikipedia:Referencing for beginners), so that the information is verifiable, and there is clear evidence of why the subject is notable and worthy of inclusion in an encyclopedia. If additional reliable sources cannot be found for the subject, then it may not be suitable for Wikipedia at this time.
Please check the submission for any additional comments left by the reviewer. You are encouraged to edit the submission to address the issues raised and resubmit when they have been resolved.
Hello! Icebob99, I noticed your article was declined at Articles for Creation, and that can be disappointing. If you are wondering why your article submission was declined, please post a question at the Articles for creation help desk. If you have any other questions about your editing experience, we'd love to help you at the Teahouse, a friendly space on Wikipedia where experienced editors lend a hand to help new editors like yourself! See you there! - TheMagnificentist (talk) 15:12, 5 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Hello everyone, and welcome to the December 2016 GOCE newsletter. We had an October newsletter all set to go, but it looks like we never pushed the button to deliver it, so this one contains a few months of updates. We have been busy and successful!
Coordinator elections for the first half of 2017: Nominations are open for election of Coordinators for the first half of 2017. Please visit the election page to nominate yourself or another editor, and then return after December 15 to vote. Thanks for participating!
September Drive: The September drive was fruitful. We set out to remove July through October 2015 from our backlog (an ambitious 269 articles), and by the end of the month, we had cut that pile of oldest articles to just 83. We reduced our overall backlog by 97 articles, even with new copyedit tags being added to articles every day. We also handled 75% of the remaining Requests from August 2016. Overall, 19 editors recorded copy edits to 233 articles (over 378,000 words).
October Blitz: this one-week copy-editing blitz ran from 16 through 22 October; the theme was Requests, since the backlog was getting a bit long. Of the 16 editors who signed up, 10 editors completed 29 requests. Barnstars and rollover totals are located here. Thanks to all editors who took part.
November Drive: The November drive was a record-breaker! We set out to remove September through December 2015 from our backlog (239 articles), and by the end of the month, we had cut that pile of old articles to just 66, eliminating the two oldest months! We reduced our overall backlog by 523 articles, to a new record low of 1,414 articles, even with new tags being added to articles every day, which means we removed copy-editing tags from over 800 articles. We also handled all of the remaining Requests from October 2016. Officially, 14 editors recorded copy edits to 200 articles (over 312,000 words), but over 600 articles, usually quick fixes and short articles, were not recorded on the drive page.
Housekeeping note: we do not send a newsletter before every drive or blitz. To have a better chance of knowing when the next event will start, add the GOCE's message box to your Watchlist.
Thank you all again for your participation; we wouldn't be able to achieve what we have without you! Cheers from your GOCE coordinators: Jonesey95, Corinne and Tdslk.
Hi Icebob99! I know you're not quite new here any longer, but I've noticed you added yourself to WikiProject Microbiology and that you've been editing lots of microbiology articles. I just wanted to pop over here and say hello and welcome aboard! It's great to see another editor interested in microbiology!! There are fairly few of us around, and so much to be done! Anyway, if you have any questions about anything at all, feel free to leave a message at my talk page. Also if you're ever looking for something to do, consider looking at this list of micro articles tagged with some concern (just over 600 more to go!). WP Classical music might have one too. Anyway, I hope you decide to stick around and help improve the encyclopedia here. We need all the hands we can get! Happy editing! Ajpolino (talk) 00:44, 13 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
@Ajpolino: thanks for the welcome! I don't really edit the Classical music WikiProject, I just put it on there as I was looking around for WikiProjects. I'll make the concerns next on my to-do list (I'm assessing all the articles with unknown quality and importance levels, only 800 left :P). Looking forward to making Wikipedia just as detailed on microbiology as anything else! Icebob99 (talk) 02:47, 13 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I think that perhaps the user saw somewhere that the source was unreliable, but apparently that somewhere was in error. Being bold on Wikipedia is of course quite easy when one thinks they are doing the right thing. Thanks for pointing this to me. Icebob99 (talk) 15:00, 21 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I hereby award this WikiCookie for your tireless work classifying the WP Micro articles. It's great to have you here. We need more editors like you. I hope you have a great holiday season! Ajpolino (talk) 21:36, 23 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Hello Icebob99, I wanted to introduce myself as Wikipedia's account coordinator for Elsevier per the discussion on Nikkimaria's talk page. I saw that you filled out the request-for-access form again on 12/22/16, as you were not sure whether or not your 12/11/16 form submission went through. I just wanted to let you know that we received both form submissions. Nikkimaria seems to have already alluded to this, but to reiterate, Elsevier has already been contacted from our end regarding giving you login credentials, but we are still waiting to hear back from them. Thanks for your patience thus far, and feel free to ping me or reach out to me on my talk page if you have any more questions, comments, or concerns. Have a great day. --JustBerry (talk) 22:07, 23 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks @JustBerry:, I appreciate the thought to reach out to my talk page! I'm in no rush (PubMed Commons is a good stopgap measure) and I'll be ready whenever the credentials are ready. Good luck with coordinating, and happy holidays! Icebob99 (talk) 22:56, 23 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
From your contribution history it seems to me you might be interested in this tool for WikiProject-assessing: User:Kephir/gadgets/rater. I find it very useful and it has saved me countless hours of time already. Just wanted to let you know about it.
Hi @凰兰时罗:, I rated it as C-class because I was too lazy to check it against the B-class criteria. C-class articles are usually evident upon a glance and require only a few spot-checks to make sure it hits the mark on verifiability and neutrality, whereas I check articles for B-class thoroughly against the six criteria listed in Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Assessment, so it's more work. Since you asked, I'll go through and check everything off since I'm curious now if it actually is B-class. Thanks for stopping by! Icebob99 (talk) 03:02, 27 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I have added the necessary citation to the statement in the body of the Merrick Garland article, but did not add it in lead per the MoS. I jumped the gun on the expiration statement last night since I had to change 60+ Judicial nominee articles to reflect the expiration of all those nominations at noon today. In any event, the article is now properly cited. Safiel (talk) 19:10, 3 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Safiel, you probably know more about when they expire more than me, so thanks for taking care of it! I had placed my citation needed tag in an abundance of caution. Everything looks good now. Have a good day, Icebob99 (talk) 21:37, 3 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
You're too kind, thanks. I'm not sure the world's ready for two of me, much less Wikipedia, but still...I do what I can to make this a more navigable place. Keeps me busy and out of trouble...mostly. :-)
i have added a few extra reference from the star and other daily newspapers.
Approximately 60% reference are from Daily newspapers (dealing with issues relating to subject matter) - thestar, nst(news staits times) & thesundaily - top three english newspapers in Malaysia - bernama - news organization that source for materials supplied to the media - malaysiakini & freemalaysiatoday (2 leading online news portals in Malaysia) - sinarharian & utusan - top two newspapers in the Malay language
Approximately 10% references are government websites (mainly dealing with Acts and other legal issues)
Another 30% references are from websites (dealing with details of the cooperative loans) such as (1) cooperatives official websites, (2) consumer organization website and (3) third party cooperative loan websites that provides details on the cooperative loans.
Hi @Alvinyong: the referencing looks good now. Before I approve it, the article has to meet one other criterion (see the flowchart to the right): the neutral point of view criterion. I'll fix the issue myself, since it's very minor, but for example: the section title "Easy to Approve" sounds like something I'd hear on a television ad rather than in an encyclopedia. Whether or not your writing is to get people to take out cooperative loans, the phrase "Easy to approve" implies that this loan is somehow better than other loans in a way that is not cited (note that the reference in that section cannot be used to justify wording like "easy to approve" because it is a bank and therefore has a conflict of interest with that wording. Facts from it are fine, but we can't use that kind of website to draw conclusions for the reader). I'll fix that myself, however, since the article is just about ready to go into mainspace.
AfC criteria flowchart
A quick question that the article doesn't clarify: is "Cooperative Loan in Malaysia" the title of a specific credit organization or just credit organizations in general in Malaysia? If it is a specific title, is the title exactly "Cooperative Loan in Malaysia" or is it something simpler like "Cooperative Loan"? The reason I ask is because the article title should read "Cooperative Loan (Malaysia)" if it is about a specific organization, or "Cooperative loans in Malaysia" if the article is about the general practice. I'll change the title of the page to read "Cooperative loans in Malaysia" for now (thus covering the practice and not a specific organization) based on what I read in the article. Please let me know if I changed it incorrectly.
Hello. I noticed you added a script that I had made to your common.js page. It seems you have added more than the required part of the script. I would suggest undoing that edit. To install the page curation script, simply copy the following into your common.js page.
mw.util.addPortletLink( 'p-personal', mw.util.wikiGetlink('Special:NewPagesFeed'), 'Page Curation', 'pt-pagecuration', 'View Special:New Pages using the Page Curation tool', null, '#pt-preferences' );
});
*/
It's under the comment tags /* */, does it still matter if it's on my common.js page? Or would it be cleaner to just remove it? Thanks, Icebob99 (talk) 14:24, 17 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. Yes. I meant that code. It would be cleaner if you simply remove it and use just the line that I've mentioned. Thanks. Lourdes14:25, 17 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
December blitz: This one-week copy-editing blitz ran from 11 through 17 December; the themes were Requests and eliminating the November 2015 backlog. Of the 14 editors who signed up, nine editors completed 29 articles. Barnstars and rollover totals are located here. Thanks to all who took part.
January drive: The January drive was a great success. We set out to remove December 2015 and January and February 2016 from our backlog (195 articles), and by 22 January we had cleared those and had to add a third month (March 2016). At the end of the month we had almost cleared out that last month as well, for a total of 180 old articles removed from the backlog! We reduced our overall backlog by 337 articles, to a low of 1,465 articles, our second-lowest month-end total ever. We also handled all of the remaining requests from December 2016. Officially, 19 editors recorded 337 copy edits (over 679,000 words).
February blitz: The one-week February blitz, focusing on the remaining March 2016 backlog and January 2017 requests, ran from 12 to 18 February. Seven editors reduced the total in those two backlog segments from 32 to 10 articles, leaving us in good shape going in to the March drive.
Coordinator elections for the first half of 2017: In December, coordinators for the first half of 2017 were elected. Jonesey95 stepped aside as lead coordinator, remaining as coordinator and allowing Miniapolis to be the lead, and Tdslk and Corinne returned as coordinators. Thanks to all who participated!
Speaking of coordinators, congratulations to Jonesey95 on their well-deserved induction into the Guild of Copy Editors Hall of Fame. The plaque reads: "For dedicated service as lead coordinator (2014, 1 July – 31 December 2015 and all of 2016) and coordinator (1 January – 30 June 2015 and 1 January – 30 June 2017); exceptional template-creation work (considerably streamlining project administration), and their emphasis on keeping the GOCE a drama-free zone."
Housekeeping note: We do not send a newsletter before every drive or blitz. To have a better chance of knowing when the next event will start, add the GOCE's message box to your watchlist.
Thank you all again for your participation; we wouldn't be able to achieve what we have without you! Cheers from your GOCE coordinators: Miniapolis, Jonesey95, Corinne and Tdslk.
And so ends the first round of the competition, with 4 points required to qualify for round 2. It would have been 5 points, but when a late entrant was permitted to join the contest in February, a promise was made that his inclusion would not result in the exclusion of any other competitor. To achieve this, the six entrants that had the lowest positive score of 4 points have been added to the 64 people who otherwise would have qualified. As a result, some of the groups have nine contestants rather than eight. Our top four scorers in round 1 were:
Cas Liber, last year's winner, led the field with two featured articles on birds and a total score of 674.
Iry-Hor, a WikiCup newcomer, came next with a featured article, a good article and a tally of 282 bonus points for a score of 517. All these points came from the article Nyuserre Ini, an Ancient Egyptian pharaoh,
1989, another WikiCup newcomer, was in joint third place at 240. 1989 has claimed points for two featured lists and one good article relating to anime and comedy series, all of which were awarded bonus points.
Peacemaker67 shared third place with five good articles and thirteen good article reviews, mostly on naval vessels. He is also new to the competition.
The largest number of DYKs have been submitted by Vivvt and The C of E, who each claimed for seven, and MBlaze Lightning achieved eight articles at ITN. Carbrera and Peacemaker67 each claimed for five GAs and Krishna Chaitanya Velaga was well out in front for GARs, having reviewed 32. No featured pictures, featured topics or good topics yet, but we have achieved three featured articles and a splendid total of fifty good articles.
So, on to the second round. Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 1 but before the start of round 2 can be claimed in round 2. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points equally.
If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is a good article candidate, a featured process, or anything else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth13:52, 1 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The second round of the competition has now closed, with just under 100 points being required to qualify for round 3. YellowEvan just scraped into the next round with 98 points but we have to say goodbye to the thirty or so competitors who didn't achieve this threshold; thank you for the useful contributions you have made to the Cup and Wikipedia. Our top scorers in round 2 were:
Cas Liber, led the field with five featured articles, four on birds and one on astronomy, and a total score of 2049, half of which came from bonus points.
1989 was in second place with 826 points, 466 of which were bonus points. 1989 has claimed points mostly relating to anime and Japanese-related articles.
Peacemaker67 took third place with two FAs, one GA and seven GARs, mostly on naval vessels or military personnel, scoring 543 points.
Other contestants who scored over 400 points were Freikorp, Carbrera, and Czar. Of course all these points are now wiped out and the 32 remaining contestants start again from zero in round 3.
Vivvt submitted the largest number of DYKs (30), and MBlaze Lightning achieved 13 articles at ITN. Carbrera claimed for 11 GAs and Argento Surfer performed the most GARs, having reviewed 11. So far we have achieved 38 featured articles and a splendid 132 good articles. Commendably, 279 GARs have been achieved so far, more than double the number of GAs.
So, on to the third round. Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 2 but before the start of round 3 can be claimed in round 3. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points equally.
If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article nominations, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to help keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth13:16, 1 May 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Your ongoing efforts to improve the encyclopedia have not gone unnoticed: You have been selected as Editor of the Week in recognition of your constructive approach to discussions. Thank you for the great contributions! (courtesy of the Wikipedia Editor Retention Project)
User Icebob99 has been a user for a little over a year now. In that short time, Icebob99 has taken strides to learn Wikipedia guidelines carefully, while demonstrating an open mind when responding to criticism. The talk page section here seems to demonstrate the editor's willingness to go to lengths to discuss issues with other editors. While the editor hasn't necessarily done significant content creation or contribute voluminous text in the way that other Hall of Fame editors may have, they have displayed a willingness and eagerness to learn which is a wonderful place to start as a Wikipedia editor.
You can copy the following text to your user page to display a user box proclaiming your selection as Editor of the Week:
Wow! This is super cool! This makes me feel bad about the RL stuff which has been taking up all my time and energy... rest assured this is only a dip and not a discontinuation. Icebob99 (talk) 02:08, 21 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The third round of the competition has finished in a flurry of last minute activity, with 288 points being required to qualify for round 4. It was a hotly competitive round with all but four of the contestants exceeding the 106 points that was necessary to proceed to round 4 last year. Coemgenus and Freikorp tied on 288, and both have been allowed to proceed, so round 4 now has one pool of eight competitors and one of nine.
Round 3 saw the achievement of a 26-topic Featured topic by MPJ-DK as well as 5 featured lists and 13 featured articles. PanagiotisZois and SounderBruce achieved their first ever featured articles. Carbrera led the GA score with 10, Tachs achieved 17 DYKs and MBlaze Lightning 10 In the news items. There were 167 DYKs, 93 GARs and 82 GAs overall, this last figure being higher than the number of GAs in round 2, when twice as many people were taking part. Even though contestants performed more GARs than they achieved GAs, there was still some frustration at the length of time taken to get articles reviewed.
As we start round 4, we say goodbye to the fifteen or so competitors who didn't quite make it; thank you for the useful contributions you have made to the Cup and Wikipedia. Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 3 but before the start of round 4 can be claimed in round 4. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them (some people have fallen foul of this rule and the points have been removed).
If you are concerned that your nomination, whether it be for a good article, a featured process, or anything else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. It would be helpful if this list could be cleared of any items no longer relevant. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to keep down the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth05:38, 30 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Round 4 of the WikiCup has ended and we move forward into the final round. In round 4, a total of 12 FAs, 3 FLs, 44 GAs, 3 FLs, 79 DYKs, 1 ITN and 42 GARs was achieved, with no FPs or FTs this time. Congratulations to Peacemaker67 on the Royal Yugoslav Navy Good Topic of 36 items, and the 12 featured articles achieved by Cas Liber (5), Vanamonde93 (3), Peacemaker67 (2), Adityavagarwal (1) and 12george1 (1). With a FA scoring 200 points, and bonus points available on top of this, FAs are likely to feature heavily in the final round. Meanwhile Yellow Evan, a typhoon specialist, was contributing 12 DYKs and 10 GAs, while Adityavagarwal and Freikorp topped the GAR list with 8 reviews each. As we enter the final round, we are down to eight contestants, and we would like to thank those of you who have been eliminated for the useful contributions you have made to the Cup and Wikipedia. The lowest score needed to reach round 5 was 305, and I think we can expect a highly competitive final round.
Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 4 but before the start of round 5 can be claimed in round 5. Remember too that you must claim your points within 10 days of "earning" them. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews Needed. It would be helpful if this list could be cleared of any items no longer relevant. If you want to help out with the WikiCup, please do your bit to reduce the review backlogs! Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck, and let the best man (or woman) win! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Godot13, Sturmvogel 66 and Cwmhiraeth06:26, 1 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
In addition to recognizing the achievements of the top finishers and everyone who worked hard to make it to the final round, we also want to recognize those participants who were most productive in each of the WikiCup scoring categories:
Featured Article – Cas Liber (actually a two-way tie with themselves for an astonishing five FAs in R2 and R4).
Good Article – Adityavagarwal had 14 GAs promoted in R5.
Over the course of the 2017 WikiCup the following content was added or improved on Wikipedia: 51 Featured Articles, 292 Good Articles, 18 Featured Lists, 1 Featured Picture, 1 Featured Topics, 4 Good Topics, around 400 Did You Knows, 75 In The News, and 442 Good Article Reviews. Thank you to all the competitors for your hard work and what you have done to improve Wikipedia.
Regarding the prize vouchers - @Adityavagarwal, Vanamonde93, Casliber, Bloom6132, 1989, and SounderBruce: please send Godot13 (talk·contribs·email) an email from the email address to which you would like your Amazon voucher sent. Please include your preference of global Amazon marketplace as well. We hope to have the electronic gift cards processed and sent within a week.
So the 2017 WikiCup has come to an end. Congratulations to the winner, to the other finalists and to all those who took part. 177 contestants signed up, more than usual, but not all of them submitted entries in the first round. Were editors attracted by the cash prizes offered for the first time this year, or were these irrelevant? Do the rules and scoring need changing for the 2018 WikiCup? If you have a view on these or other matters, why not join in the WikiCup discussion about next year's contest? Sturmvogel 66 (talk·contribs·email), Godot13 (talk·contribs·email) and Cwmhiraeth (talk·contribs·email). MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:59, 17 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, Icebob99. Voting in the 2017 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 10 December. All users who registered an account before Saturday, 28 October 2017, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Wednesday, 1 November 2017 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.
The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.
Hello copy editors! Welcome to the December 2017 GOCE newsletter, which contains nine months(!) of updates. The Guild has been busy and successful; your diligent efforts in 2017 has brought the backlog of articles requiring copy edit to below 1,000 articles for the first time. Thanks to all editors who have contributed their time and energy to help make this happen.
Our copy-editing drives (month-long backlog-reduction drives held in odd-numbered months) and blitzes (week-long themed editing in even-numbered months) have been very successful this year.
March drive: We set out to remove April, May, and June 2016 from our backlog and all February 2017 Requests (a total of 304 articles). By the end of the month, all but 22 of these articles were cleared. Officially, of the 28 who signed up, 22 editors recorded 257 copy edits (439,952 words). (These numbers do not always make sense when you compare them to the overall reduction in the backlog, because not all editors record every copy edit on the drive page.)
April blitz: This one-week copy-editing blitz ran from 16 through 22 April; the theme was Requests. Of the 15 who signed up, 9 editors completed 43 articles (81,822 words).
May drive: The goals were to remove July, August, and September 2016 from the backlog and to complete all March 2017 Requests (a total of 300 articles). By the end of the month, we had reduced our overall backlog to an all-time low of 1,388 articles. Of the 28 who signed up, 17 editors completed 187 articles (321,810 words).
June blitz: This one-week copy-editing blitz ran from 18 through 24 June; the theme was Requests. Of the 16 who signed up, 9 editors completed 28 copy edits (117,089 words).
2017 Coordinator elections: In June, coordinators for the second half of 2017 were elected. Jonesey95 moved back into the lead coordinator position, with Miniapolis stepping down to remain as coordinator; Tdslk and Corinne returned as coordinators, and Keira1996 rejoined after an extended absence. Thanks to all who participated!
July drive: We set out to remove August, September, October, and November 2016 from the backlog and to complete all May and June 2017 Requests (a total of 242 articles). The drive was an enormous success, and the target was nearly achieved within three weeks, so that December 2016 was added to the "old articles" list used as a goal for the drive. By the end of the month, only three articles from 2016 remained, and for the second drive in a row, the backlog was reduced to a new all-time low, this time to 1,363 articles. Of the 33 who signed up, 21 editors completed 337 articles (556,482 words).
August blitz: This one-week copy-editing blitz ran from 20 through 26 August; the theme was biographical articles tagged for copy editing for more than six months (47 articles). Of the 13 who signed up, 11 editors completed 38 copy edits (42,589 words).
September drive: The goals were to remove January, February, and March 2017 from the backlog and to complete all August 2017 Requests (a total of 338 articles). Of the 19 who signed up, 14 editors completed 121 copy edits (267,227 words).
October blitz: This one-week copy-editing blitz ran from 22 through 28 October; the theme was Requests. Of the 14 who signed up, 8 editors completed 20 articles (55,642 words).
November drive: We set out again to remove January, February, and March 2017 from the backlog and to complete all October 2017 Requests (a total of 207 articles). By the end of the month, these goals were reached and the backlog shrank to its lowest total ever, 997 articles, the first time it had fallen under one thousand (click on the graph above to see this amazing feat in graphical form). It was also the first time that the oldest copy-edit tag was less than eight months old. Of the 25 who signed up, 16 editors completed 159 articles (285,929 words).
2018 Coordinator elections: Voting is open for the election of coordinators for the first half of 2018. Please visit the election page to vote between now and December 31 at 23:59 (UTC). Thanks for participating!
Housekeeping note: We do not send a newsletter before (or after) every drive or blitz. To have a better chance of knowing when the next event will start, add the GOCE's message box to your watchlist.
Thank you all again for your participation; we wouldn't be able to achieve what we have without you! Cheers from your GOCE coordinators: Jonesey95, Miniapolis, Corinne, Tdslk, and Keira1996.
Welcome to the February 2018 GOCE newsletter in which you will find Guild updates since the December edition. We got to a great start for the year, holding the backlog at nine months. 100 requests were submitted in the first 6 weeks of the year and were swiftly handled with an average completion time of 9 days.
Coordinator elections: In December, coordinators for the first half of 2018 were elected. Jonesey95 remained as lead coordinator and Corrine, Miniapolis and Tdslk as assistant coordinators. Keira1996 stepped down as assistant coordinator and was replaced by Reidgreg. Thanks to all who participated!
End of year reports were prepared for 2016 and 2017, providing a detailed look at the Guild's long-term progress.
January drive: We set out to remove April, May, and June 2017 from our backlog and all December 2017 Requests (a total of 275 articles). As with previous years, the January drive was an outstanding success and by the end of the month all but 57 of these articles were cleared. Officially, of the 38 who signed up, 21 editors recorded 259 copy edits (490,256 words).
February blitz: This one-week copy-editing blitz ran from 11 through 17 February, focusing on Requests and the last articles tagged in May 2017. At the end of the week there were only 14 pending requests, with none older than 20 days. Of the 11 who signed up, 10 editors completed 35 copy edits (98,538 words).
Thank you all again for your participation; we wouldn't be able to achieve what we have without you! Cheers from your GOCE coordinators: Jonesey95, Miniapolis, Corinne, Tdslk, and Reidgreg.
And so ends the first round of the competition, with 4 points required to qualify for round 2. With 53 contestants qualifying, the groups for round 2 are slightly smaller than usual, with the two leaders from each group due to qualify for round 3 as well as the top sixteen remaining users.
Our top scorers in round 1 were:
Aoba47 led the field with a featured article, 8 good articles and 42 GARs, giving a total of 666 points.
FrB.TG , a WikiCup newcomer, came next with 600 points, gained from a featured article and masses of bonus points.
Ssven2, another WikiCup newcomer, was in third place with 403 points, garnered from a featured article, a featured list, a good article and twelve GARs.
Ceranthor, Numerounovedant, Carbrera, Farang Rak Tham and Cartoon network freak all had over 200 points, but like all the other contestants, now have to start again from scratch. A good achievement was the 193 GARs performed by WikiCup contestants, comparing very favourably with the 54 GAs they achieved.
Remember that any content promoted after the end of round 1 but before the start of round 2 can be claimed in round 2. Invitations for collaborative writing efforts or any other discussion of potentially interesting work is always welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Remember, if two or more WikiCup competitors have done significant work on an article, all can claim points. If you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews.
The second round of the 2018 WikiCup has now finished. Most contestants who advanced to the next round scored upwards of 100 points, but two with just 10 points managed to scrape through into round 3. Our top scorers in the last round were:
Cas Liber, our winner in 2016, with three featured articles
Iazyges, with nine good articles and lots of bonus points
Yashthepunisher, a first time contestant, with two featured lists
SounderBruce, a finalist last year, with seventeen good topic articles
Usernameunique, a first time contestant, with fourteen DYKs
Muboshgu, a seasoned competitor, with three ITNs and
Courcelles, another first time contestant, with twenty-seven GARs
So far contestants have achieved twelve featured articles between them and a splendid 124 good articles. Commendably, 326 GARs have been completed during the course of the 2018 WikiCup, so the backlog of articles awaiting GA review has been reduced as a result of contestants' activities. As we enter the third round, remember that any content promoted after the end of round 2 but before the start of round 3 can be claimed in round 3. Remember too that you must claim your points within 14 days of "earning" them. When doing GARs, please make sure that you check that all the GA criteria are fully met; most of the GARs are fine, but a few have been a bit skimpy.