Jump to content

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Wikipedia Awards

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by ItharTheSyrianArchiver101 (talk | contribs) at 22:54, 1 February 2017. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Deletionist barnstar proposal

Image for proposed deleter's barnstar

I see that in Archive 12 there was a brief discussion regarding creating a deleter's barnstar to award to admins who delete articles. The proposal was killed when it was pointed out that we already have a "dilligent admin" barnstar for such individuals. I am here to propose a barnstar for those who are NOT admins but who work just as diligently to hold back the tidal wave of nonesense that would come to occupy the pages of Wikipedia otherwise. I don't just mean new page patrolling, I mean being willing to stand up and say, "I think this article should be deleted", and standing behind that statement, and making a worthwhile argument for the deletion. It's hard to nominate articles for deletion! It's hard to nominate an article and then have other editors come along and say you are "clearly wrong" for whatever reason. It's hard to watch your nomination fail, even if you are wrong, and then pick yourself up and try to do it again when you feel you are right. Saving articles is all well and good, but if we save garbage, what then is the point? I believe we also should acknowledge and reward those who work against infinite odds to keep the garbage/ trivia/ promotional hoo-ha out! We should encourage them to keep doing what they do in order to keep Wikipedia an encyclopedia and not a collection of indiscriminate information. I am not talking about admins here— they can delete at will. I am talking about the editors with the courage to brave the slings and arrows and insults (and they are many) for daring to propose that the wheat be separated from the chaff, a barnstar for those who are willing to consider the references and actually figure out if they are bogus or not. It is easy to create a Wikipedia article! Getting one deleted is not nearly so simple. It is a thankless and often bitter job. It is also crucial to the project's operation. And I do not see any other suitable barnstar at the moment. Thoughts? KDS4444 (talk) 08:19, 15 November 2016 (UTC) Guess I should have created an image first. Anyhow, now there's an image. KDS4444 (talk) 07:18, 22 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • I am sensing at least no opposition to this idea, and no indication that there is another barnstar that already serves this purpose. I am going to go ahead and make the barnstar "official", others are welcome to undo the edit and respond to my proposal here if that seems premature or inappropriate. KDS4444 (talk) 14:59, 23 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    • @KDS4444: My only real objection would be using "deletionist", which is a loaded, messy term. Deletion in general is messy, really, and I imagine there are plenty of people who would not want to receive an award for deletion. There's a lot of ill will directed towards people who tag pages for deletion (usually due more to being unfamiliar with Wikipedia policies/guidelines/norms) and I imagine any negative impact deletion might have on, say, a new contributor, could be exacerbated by the person doing the deletion receiving an award for it. For whatever that's worth. But even if I truly objected (which I don't), I don't see much of a point to standing in the way of an award -- it's a pro-community activity and, after all, anyone can create a graphic and post it on a page themselves without it needing to be legitimated (people can always remove what they don't want, and MfD exists for particularly problematic templates -- of which this is not one). — Rhododendrites talk \\ 15:17, 23 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    • What about something a little more subtle: Sanitation Department Barnstar, Sanitation Engineer Barnstar, Waste Management Specialist Barnstar, Wheat-Chaff Barnstar... — Rhododendrites talk \\ 15:24, 23 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
      I like those, especially "Wheat-Chaff Barnstar". —Granger (talk · contribs) 19:29, 23 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
(Also, @Rhododendrites: I have to admit you are right regarding the loaded nature of the term "deletionist" or "deleter". I maintain my belief that it is actually very difficult to stand by a deletion nomination, and that Wikipedia is only useful to the world specifically because people bother to take out the stuff that doesn't belong here, but I also agree that deletion is a loaded business, and that especially for new users it is a shocking and painful thing to have experienced, and is NOT the thing such a user then wants to see someone actually rewarded for! I am just thinking about the other side of that coin, and I know that I have watched other editors nominate pages for deletion and then get put through the ringer for it and never come back, which is ALSO a bad thing. And I do not know that there is a real answer for the situation... I know that it sounds great to give awards to those who work hard to save pages from the dustbin, but the dustbin is there for a reason, too. I dunno now... More thoughts?? ) KDS4444 (talk) 19:30, 24 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - I agree with what you're saying above. I'm very familiar with the pains of deleting what needs to be deleted. Part of why I don't like the term "deletionist" (at all -- not just for a barnstar) is that it creates a false and dichotomy that taps into the off-wiki world for connotations. "Inclusion"=friends, fairness, affirmations; "deletion" (or, relative to inclusion, "exclusion")=destruction, discrimination, dismissal... So no, there's not enough love shown to those who engage in the necessary task anyway. :) This one looks great to me. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 16:38, 25 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  • Consensus Then given the above, I am going to interpret this as meaning we have community consensus and move this barnstar over to the official list of barnstars page. Thank you for your help in guiding the process! If it had gone ahead as I had originally proposed it, I think it would have been too controversial and never-used. Now, I think it says what it is meant to say and should serve its purpose without making anyone upset or offended (or at least so I am now hoping!). KDS4444 (talk) 11:08, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Verifiability of Barnstars

Should there not be a system to ensure that barnstars can be verified back to the person awarding them. In the present case, we can add as many barnstars to our own user page and add a user name without the link back to the awarding user's pager. Or better still attribute it to a user who has since been blocked. The date can be an old date and nobody will suspect whether the barnstar was really given. PierceBrosnan007 (talk) 14:38, 4 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support I came across an incident once where a new-ish user opened up a few sockpuppet accounts and then began awarding himself a series of barnstars in an attempt to make himself appear more legitimate and involved than he really was. The account eventually got blocked, but it was messy figuring out what was going on. While each edit to a user's page is, of course, recorded, this is only visible if someone looks at the page's edit history. A more upfront tracking system seems like a good idea to me. KDS4444 (talk) 11:59, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The Special Barnstar
An irrelevant barnstar to prove a point Example 19:22, 18 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Many people indeed to this -- new users in particular. I don't think you'll find much support for formalizing such processes. Barnstars are a way of fostering community and showing gratitude. The value in someone's gallery of barnstars isn't in the barnstars but the sentiments behind them, and that value is much more for the user him/herself than it is for outsiders. A barnstar is a way to show people recognition for their volunteer efforts [so that they will continue to participate and continue their enthusiasm for the project]. That said, if there's reason to look into someone's standing in the community, and someone has been giving themselves barnstars to mislead others, any positive impression formed upon seeing them would be more than shattered upon realizing they're... [inauthentic?]. In your example above, you forged someone else's signature, however, which is not ok in any context -- even as an example you should replace it with, say, User:Example. — Rhododendrites talk \\ 14:50, 4 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The example user name part is valid and I have changed it. But how do you expect people to know the forgery of barnstars so as to remove their positive impression. I really don't think people would search the user's history page. And if you mentioned in the edit summary that the barnstars were moved from an old page to a revamped user page, most people would not go searching anymore. And maybe a barnstar can be used to start off the next barnstar. People are usually reluctant to award an unawarded writer. However if we see a good edit and go to the user's page to see a host of barnstars already awarded (albeit forged), you might be tempted to give him an award of your own. Just my thoughts. PierceBrosnan007 (talk) 15:58, 4 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Personally I would lean more towards recognizing someone who hasn't gotten a lot of previous thanks, to help spread the appreciation around. isaacl (talk) 16:06, 4 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Project page is getting unwieldy

Has anyone noticed that the barnstar awards project page is getting a bit unwieldy? No matter how slowly I try to scroll through the list, the barnstars flip by super fast because a.) there are a lot of them, and b.) the column for the barnstar's description is so narrow that any text placed here quickly makes the overall table very long in appearance and difficult to review. Is there something we can do to shorten it visually? What if we put all of the description text in "small" font? Other ideas? KDS4444 (talk) 12:07, 7 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Shogi barnstar

Awhile back I made a proposal to start a new WikiProject for shogi-related content on Wikipedia. There was some support, but things are still basically in the proposal stage. Anyway, I was wondering if it would be possible to create a barnstar for shogi (similar to Template:Chess Barnstar) that could be added to the talk pages of editors who have been regularly working on improving shogi's coverage on Wikipedia, even if there is no WikiProject specifically devoted to the subject. The barnstar does not have to be anything fancy, and there are a number of images in c:Category:Shogi which could be used for the central image. Would something like this be OK to try and do? -- Marchjuly (talk) 04:57, 13 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Seems fine to me. My only recommendation is to consider WP:COLOR. Make sure it's visually distinct and readable to those with low vision, color blindness, or using interfaces where the image is small. EvergreenFir (talk) 05:45, 13 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Bravery Barnstar

File:BraveryBarnstarjpg.jpg
Bravery Barnstar

@Antonu and Aspro:Hi! I desperately want to give somebody (who shall remain nameless) a barnstar for Bravery. The person "took the bull by the horns" and acted bravely while the person's peers simply looked on. I think this one is perfect! Comments? DennisPietras (talk) 21:59, 14 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Barnstars for work on various religions, but not for atheists/humanists/agnostics?

I am not even sure if/how such an award would be earned, but while there are Barnstars for beliefs including (this list is probably not exhaustive) Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, Jewish/Judaism, Hinduism, Jainism, and Zoroastrianism, there do not appear to be any awards for editors who make outstanding contributions to content that is atheist, humanist or agnostic in nature - or deliberately anti-religious.

Is this a solution in search of a problem? Is it an overstretch to ensure that there is balance in The Force (which in fact brings to mind an idea for another award, but I will leave that to others), or should there be such awards?Ambiguosity (talk) 04:40, 29 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Something like Template:Wp atheism barnstar, which has been around for 9 years? Achowat (talk) 20:58, 30 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Islamic Barnstar 2.0

This is simple, I wish to update the Islamic barnstar. It features the star and crescent which has been historically used, and I have incorporated these historic symbols into a barnstar in order to suit it.

File:2.0 Islam Barnstar.png
2.0 Islamic Barnstar.

(talk) 22:58, 01 February 2017 (GMT)

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Wikipedia_Awards&oldid=763211516"