Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Core topics

This is the talk page for the CORE TOPICS sub-project of the Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team.

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• Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Core topics/Tree worksheet

WP1.0 editorial team discussions – Core topics COTW – Wiki sort discussions – FAs first discussions – Work via WikiProjects discussions – Pushing to 1.0 discussions

I propose that the current information at Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Core topics be replaced entirely or largely with the information at this page: User:Silence/Core.

I've been working on this list, in various forms, for over a month now. If we're going to try to avoid overdiscussing list details as much as possible so as not to waste time and energy, then I would argue that this list would be a vastly stronger starting point for us to rely on than the current list is: it's not only greatly-enhanced in terms of coverage, with many of the less-important and lower-quality articles replaced by vastly more-important (bye-bye oceanography, hello water!) and higher-quality (bye-bye craft, hello Sun!) ones, and has exactly 150 articles, but also has been thoroughly checked-over, with each entry's article reviewed, and most of them updated with new information.

Numerous errors have also been fixed, like typos, inaccuracies, dab-page-listings, mis-alphabetizations, etc. Furthermore, all the badly out-of-date sections of the page (except, for the sake of expediency, for "Changes from original list", which I will update on request if anyone wants me to) have been updated, including "Article status summary", and I have added dozens of links to relevant WikiProjects in the convenient, yet previously woefully unused, column allocated to them, allowing users to immediately see, for example, that there is a WikiProject for organized improvements to ecology article (Wikipedia:WikiProject Ecology), a very valuable resource for a project like Core Topics. -Silence 04:53, 17 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I just repeat myself: great work! :) The list is really much better. But what if I don't agree with a Removed entry? And why is it in the discussion namespace? NCurse _work 05:42, 18 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, this is extremely useful. I don't have time to discuss a lot more right now, but I really like the work you have done. Having an up-to-date list with assessments is extremely valuable to the project, and I appreciate that you have incorporated many of the feedback from our earlier debates. Also, your joining the project as a working member is a great step forward. I'll try and check in here again tomorrow with more comments. Walkerma 06:08, 18 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• To answer NCurse's questions: if you disagree with a Removed entry, say so and I'll re-add it if I agree, or talk it over until we reach a compromise. You can also feel free to make changes yourself, if you prefer; whichever you find more convenient and expedient. My proposal is not an attempt to force my specific changes on the page, but rather to speed up and clarify the process of discussing what to remove and what to add, so as to avoid the problem Walkerma mentioned of overdiscussing matters where we have at least a decent (even if not ideal) status quo; I'll gladly make dozens of alterations to the list, if that's what's needed before it can be implemented. I just figured having a solid, obvious version would (1) make things go quicker, and (2) make it more obvious what the differences between the two versions. (For example, the current Core Topics list has many, many more "Start"-level articles than my proposed version does, because I've responded to the earlier arguments Walkerma made about choosing higher-quality pages over lower-quality ones by heavily revising my listing to have a higher number of important, but also very well-written and comprehensive, pages.) As for why it's in the discussion namespace, it's meant to be a temporary page until we can agree on a version to replace the current text at Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Core topics, so I didn't want to give it its own Wikipedia page. It was formerly at my userspace (User:Silence/Core), but I moved it to here so other people would feel more free to make changes to it. I may move it back to my userspace after we're done discussing and implementing it, since at that point we can simply go back to making changes and updates at Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Core topics itself. It doesn't really matter where it's placed; if you would prefer a shorter page title, for example, feel free to move it.
• To answer Walkerma: Thanks! I expect that we'll disagree over a few matters, but am very willing to make changes in response to specific suggestions and explanations (for example, if you think Fungus isn't noteworthy enough but Natural environment is, that's certainly a change I'd be willing to make), but my list isn't meant to be "perfect" anymore than the current one is: it's merely meant to be a lot better, so we have firmer ground to base ourselves on in continuing to make improvements and utilize the Core Topics for various affairs (like WikiProject and CD ratings). What's important is that we be consistent, and I think that the suggested list does a much better job than the one we currently have on the Core Topics page (with its glaring errors, like linking to the dab page environment and listing oceanography in lieu of ocean or even water). Anyway, look forward to your feedback, as soon as you have the time! -Silence 06:21, 18 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I spoke with Maurreen on the phone, and she's OK with us making these changes. I'd like to propose the following:

• As Silence proposes, change our current Core Topics list to Silence's latest list. I prefer this to our current list, and it seems as if others do too. We can nitpick at the list once it's in place, making incremental changes as needed.
• I would like to formally ask if Silence would be willing to take over leading this project. As you can see from the main WP:1.0 page, we don't have anyone running things here, which is why things have been neglected for a while. I've been a kind of "caretaker" here just to make sure things didn't die, but I think Silence would bring a lot of fresh ideas and new energy. This is an important project which deserves committed people, so I hope that Silence can spare the time to do this. If he can manage also to oversee the COTF as well that would be great, if not, then I will carry on as "caretaker" there as well, or we could share things.
• Regarding a transition from one core list to another, I would suggest moving any ex-Core topics into the supplement as a default, and if we want to debate removing any of these from there we can. I suspect many of them will be quite appropriate there. That will also make things simpler as we change over, for example with people voting (as someone did tonight) to support Biotechnology as a Core Topics COTF. Since I am in contact with many of the WikiProjects anyway, I am willing to let those folks know about any changes to their worklists.
• I'd like to see the articles in the supplement assessed, so we can start to use the list.
• Mathbot is currently generating this set of output, updated each night. We will need to think about how we handle supplement articles - do we want to use the same template, or a new one, or not bother? I would suggest using one single template to simplify things, but using the "importance" parameter to separate them into Main and Supplement. The bot is a useful way of getting the table automatically updated to keep up with assessment changes as articles get improved, and provides metadata right there on the article talk page.

So then, Silence, thank you for your tenacity, insights and sheer hard work (assessing 150 articles from scratch is many, many hours work, I know!). We should use that work to revive this flagging project, hopefully under your leadership if you're willing to take the helm. Thanks, Walkerma 02:51, 19 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

FYI, for the sake of clarity, I'd like to elaborate a little on my phone conversation with Martin. Essentially, I'm going along with him and supporting Silence coordinating this. If Silence has the time and the inclination, thanks, that's great.

About details of the changes, I'm going along with Martin. Doesn't mean I agree with Silence. Means I don't have time right now to work on it. Ciao. Maurreen 05:41, 19 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• "As Silence proposes, change our current Core Topics list to Silence's latest list. I prefer this to our current list, and it seems as if others do too. We can nitpick at the list once it's in place, making incremental changes as needed." - I'm honored and delighted that you're OK with the list; thank you very much for being understanding! I look forward very much to the nitpicking and discussion, at our leisure: we have plenty of time to fine-tune the list once the big change is done with. What matters in the short term is that we make certain especially significant changes as soon as possible, because the Core Topics list is now starting to be used by many other projects on Wikipedia. That's the only reason to rush: once we've made the most significnt fixes (e.g., replacing the articles on individual religions with more basic articles like fire and color: those religion articles are indeed high-quality, but not really "basic" or general enough for the "top 150" list; the 0.5 CD selection and the Supplemental lists are much better places for them, and prevents the inevitable problem of being accused of bias), we'll not need to rush any more of the overhauls or alterations, as we'll at least have a more consistent and up-to-date listing to start from.
• "I would like to formally ask if Silence would be willing to take over leading this project." - Hm. I'm not sure I should. I'm something of a rookie to this page, relative to a lot of you: you guys do have more experience. My main advantage was that I gave a "fresh" perspective to the list: I wasn't around for all the haggling and debating over each individual article, so I could review the list from the perspective of an outsider, which is the perspective most people judging the project will have. The list should explain itself: we shouldn't need to explain its history in-depth in order to justify what articles it includes. But because of my inexperience in working on this project, I don't think I'd make a good "leader" at this point. Additionally, although I have plenty of free time now, I can't promise that I will forever (especially after mid-August). I'd feel more comfortable and useful as just some guy who works hard to keep the list up-to-date and comprehensive, than as someone leading the whole project; I tend to be more productive as a second-hand-man, because it gives me enough control to make changes where necessary, but frees me from the responsibilities of running the whole thing so I can spend more time actually working on the list. Also, I don't want my ideas to be given higher priority than other people's, as I'm worried might happen if I was promoted: suggestions should be judged on their merits, not based on who's making them. So: Again, I'm honored, but I don't think it would be a good idea, at least at this point.
• "I think Silence would bring a lot of fresh ideas and new energy." - That's my job. :) If I can do that without running the project, I'll be happy.
• "Regarding a transition from one core list to another, I would suggest moving any ex-Core topics into the supplement as a default, and if we want to debate removing any of these from there we can." - Fair enough. You can see all the formerly-listed entries at the bottom of my version's page. Listing them at "Supplemental" would indeed be a good way to give us time to carefully-review the changes later on, though I expect a fair number of the removed entries not to make the cut (like mathematical proof and oceanography). -Silence 08:17, 19 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm ready to recategorize and retemplatify the Core Topics now, per recent changes, if noone objects. The current categories and template placements for Category:Core topics articles by quality is badly out-of-date. I'm assuming that these categories are only for the main, 150-article list, not for the Supplementals (hence if we do eventually categorize the Supplementals, they'll probably be in a different set of categories). So, shall I go ahead with the switchover? -Silence 03:44, 21 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Just go ahead. We will look after your work. :) NCurse _work 08:11, 21 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK, done. -Silence 08:52, 21 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The table is rarely updated and can be overwhelming. I'd like to move it to a subpage. Maurreen 22:47, 15 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The table is long with a lot of information. I agree about moving it to a subpage - including moving the "Removed entries" section along with it as well. Vir 06:02, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I hate to see it go but you're quite right, it's a bit much. If I ever get time to work on this list again I'd like to see at least a concise summary list included here - would your "tree" serve that purpose, Maureen? Walkerma 06:31, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Sorry, Martin. I think we don't have enough people working on this to support the table.

Having a summary makes sense. I'm not sure which tree you mean. Do you mean essentially adding to the Article Status Summary? That'd be good. I had thought of moving Martin's tree over. But I think it is outdated because of Silence's changes. Maurreen 12:17, 19 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The table is useful. It doesn't need to be revised weekly to be useful. If there is another article tracking method that is better than the table, fine. Otherwise, if no one else wants to work on the core topics table, I'd be happy work on it with Silence in a few months. Just can't do it now. If Silence still wants to work on it then perhaps that is enough effort. And perhaps other folks will pitch in. Vir 01:21, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I moved the table and list of removed items to the same subpage, and I added a tree listing all the current core topics. Maurreen 14:50, 20 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The tree is a good exercise in general and a helpful way to present the core topics. A few things: In the tree, the subcategories of the applied science category didn't work too well together. So, I moved the applied subcategories to other categories where they seemed to fit better, including these moves: Env. -- Life Science; Comm --> Soc Sci. I also made these moves (and a few other misc. moves): History --> Humanities (including Civilization under History rather than Soc Sci Misc where it could also fit) ; Race --> Soc Sci Misc (note that race is studied very extensively (perhaps most extensively) in sociology -- but also in other fields - hence, like and along with gender, race is perhaps best in Soc Sci Misc) Vir 21:02, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ps. Communication (and its elements) could fit just as well in Humanities or Social Science categories, like history which can fit in both (and includes aspects of both). Vir 21:02, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, it looks good overall. I had debated a couple of ways of breaking up "Communication." But "Information" seems out of place under "Physical science". I would never look for it there, but I'm not sure where is best. Maurreen 00:31, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome. Based on your comment, I moved "information" to the Communication subcat. It does fit there. I think there are some physics theories that include information along with mater-energy as part of theory, which is why i put it there. But, this is not that sense of information that we usually think of.

After reflection, I moved the communication subcategory from soc science, where I first put it, to humanities. "Communications" is not the name of a specific soc sci discipline - rather, there are a number of media/comm disciplines with similar names to "comm." or that fall under that head, that would fit in humanities, though some belong in soc. sciences, such as linguistics. This category stuff is often a fuzzy excercise.

Btw, I'm going to let this ID go to sleep a longish awhile -- esplained on my user page. But I'll reappear to contribute in bits in ongoing ways here sometime in next few months with another ID. Vir 16:53, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. The "information" move is good. See you later. Maurreen 16:57, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to replace Nuclear power with the original Nuclear technology, which had been deliberately chosen to encompass both nuclear power and nuclear weapons. Maurreen 15:16, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, definitely. Nuclear power would be better at the WP:VA level, I think. Walkerma 23:19, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I’m thinking we could move these stubs to the supplement:

• Health
• Metal
• Motion (physics)
• Landform
• Visual arts

Maurreen 16:52, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

And Matter. Maurreen 17:12, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I could accept losing landform, which to some extent is covered in continent; Sure, it's very "core", but I personally can't imagine ever wanting to look it up - I would look up something more tangible. Visual arts is also covered somewhat in other core articles, but I'd be more likely to look it up I think. As for the others, I think they belong in core topics (IMHO) and we can't easily substitute them, so they should stay despite being at the stub/start level.

On balance, I think I'd prefer that we kept these. None of them are hardcore stubs, mere dictionary definitions. Silence made a good point: we shouldn't relegate true core topics on the basis of quality alone, rather, we should try to improve those articles so they are usable. Another point: Maybe some of these topics should be fairly short articles anyway, with use of {{main}} to direct the reader to the more detailed articles? Take a look at Chemical substance to see the kind of thing I mean. It used to be a dictionary-type stub - now I think it covers the ground in four screenfuls perfectly well. It may take a couple of years, but I'd like to see us work on these stubs through the COTF until we get these at least to the B-Class level. It's a hard choice -what do others think? Walkerma 23:57, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't feel strongly about them, but I'm trying to tune some things up and I figure it's worth asking.

I do agree that some articles should probably stay short.

The COTF doesn't get a lot of participation.

Various things will evolve. Maurreen 03:31, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Similar to Chemical substance, Performing arts has developed from one screen to four. We have Visual arts in the core but apparently removed Performing arts. I see these two as parallel. I'd like to see them together. I am open about whether they are in the core or the supplement. Maurreen 05:31, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to restore Painting. We have Visual arts, Art, Drawing and Sculpture. I don't know why "Painting" was removed. Maurreen 03:42, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, looks nice but for refs, a B, I can't understand it going either. Walkerma 04:13, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Painting" is a much more specific topic than Visual arts and Art (painting is a type of each), Sculpture (about as broad as "visual arts"), and Drawing (which encompasses not only artistic drawing, but illustration of all kind, including architectural drawings). I wouldn't mind removing Drawing from the list too, though, if people feel it's too specific for the top 150, like Painting. -Silence 04:52, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

In my view, Painting and Sculpture are generally at the same level; they should be together one place or the other. But if we have a 2-1 split on this, I will let it go for now and leave things as they are. Maurreen 05:03, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think this should be added to core topics, alongside "planet", "star", "galaxy" and "universe." Serendipodous 14:53, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think astronomy is already over-represented. How about using "Solar system" to replace one or more items in the section? Maurreen 18:50, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

For example, the list has twice as many astronomy entries as chemistry entries. Maurreen 19:29, 23 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Many articles seem to work as sets. I joined this project because I really see the value in this way of doing things and learned a lot from working with User:Maurreen and User:Sunray on the Community article. I noticed that the "main" articles that appear on "core topic" articles are important, too. Just a few exapmles in the Community context are Community development, Sense of community and Structure and agency articles. The Work via WikiProjects way is, IMO the only best better way to handle such complexity if you have well organized WikiProjects.

I've had a theory for a long time that "topics" have to be handled with plenty of focus and guidance. I see that North America is getting some attention and as one can see, its "context" is humongous! Though Louisville is only one city in one U.S. state called Kentucky, there are plenty of people there who know a lot about it and are well qualified to perfect that article. Yet The United States is only a country in North America. (Follow the linkage to see where I'm going with this). I think that The Places Team at WP:1.0 can provide much leadership in this area and has already.

Similarly, the Core Team (you folks) could help along struggling projects like Wikipedia:WikiProject International law by coordining and connecting their efforts to more successfull projects like Wikipedia:WikiProject Law. But from what I've seen from here, the Law wikiproject isn't very enthused about WP:1.0 assessments. However, the smaller project, which doesn't even have a listing here might be more inclined to get on board. That's why I nominated the International law article, which appears at the #5 spot when you google "international law" as a search term. I found all this out when doing research for the international community article.

One more point. Many WikiProjects focus on Portals. WikiProject U.S. states is working to focus and guide several of the WikiProject (Your state) projects toward United States, before building their own state or city portal. If and when interest in North America wins it a COTF spot, I believe that Portal:North America should be kept in mind here and members of this crew can start Wikipedia:WikiProject North America to help manage the article and its context.

The big thing here for editors and readers alike is ease of use and logical structures. I've been dealing with WikiProjects, Portals, Templates and Categories (including Category:Wikipedians from a holistic standpoint for a while. In fact, though I can't prove it directly, I may have been partially responsible for the creation of the Portal namespace. (You'ld have to study the deletion logs for deleted WikiProjects). It may even be a good idea to use Wikipedia:WikiProject Core as a catylist for bringing about Project:Core (the Project:(topic) namespace is a new namespace to replace Wikipedia:WikiProject (topic)) to go along with Portal:Core (which replaced Wikipedia:Wikiportal (topic)). It would certainly reduce typing and simplify linking. See Wikipedia:WikiProject_Community#Applied_community_development_at_Wikipedia for an idea. Just my $0.02 worth. Sorry for the long post. • CQ 02:33, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, CQ. Thanks for joining us. I enjoy your enthusiasm.

About Wikipedia:WikiProject Law or a project for North America -- I'm sorry, but I think you overestimate us. What you have in mind would be a lot of work, a lot of detail, and probably a continuing effort in a relatively narrow area. That's not something that I at least am interested in. To some degree, it would be the opposite of my general focus -- essentially improving the top of the WP "tree of knowledge."

At some level, that includes all the articles on countries. I had started a 1.0 subproject on geography, but I got little help and abandoned it.

I think you and I might have more overlap with your ideas for Wikipedia:WikiProject Core and Portal:Core. I don't fully understand you, but you might be interested in Category: Wikipedia core topics. I had thought about linking at least some of these with templates and more-similar names and other ideas. Maurreen 06:41, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I may be asking in the correct place - I doubt it, but here goes: Is something wrong with The GA-category? I noticed in the Community articles by quality tables that Community doesn't show up. Also on the GA listing on one of the main lists for Core Topics No GA's show up. Could there be a glitch somewhere? CQ 23:12, 8 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I can't help you with that. It would be better to ask at Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Work via Wikiprojects. Maurreen 03:44, 9 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I removed these two from the tree: Calculus and Non-euclidean geometries. Our practices is to discuss changes to the list before making them. I would go along with calculus if at least one item is deleted from the sciences. Maurreen 15:53, 2 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Calculus is about as core as you can get, though one might argue Mathematical analysis is even moreso. It's just not the greatest article. Any of the following I would consider to be less core in it's branch of knowledge: Big Bang, moon, color, fire, brain, sex. Each deals with a bit more detail, and isn't nearly as foundational to as many fields of knowledge. Non-euclidean geometries I don't think is all that fundamental.

While we're at it I would say advertising is not one of the top fundamental concepts in Business/Economics. Risk management would probably underlie more such as insurance, finance, disaster planning, etc, but maybe I'm biased on that. Marketing even is more fundamental than advertising. - Taxman ^Talk 22:45, 2 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Eh, one more comment. Aren't there some relatively standard trees of knowledge out there that we can use as a base. LOC, other library systems etc. I assume they'd all be different, but if we had a way of averaging their top 100, 200 topics, etc then we could avoid reinventing the wheel. - Taxman ^Talk 22:50, 2 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that calculus should be in core topics if at all possible. I'm more doubtful about NE geometry. Walkerma 23:32, 2 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Calculus must be absolutely must be in. Every 16-18 year old student in maths studies it and very important in other fields like physics. I'd say Mathematical analysis is really the daughter of Calculus: MA the field where the rules of high-school calculus are proved and generalised, so less important practically but more important theoretically (deeper). Agree most could happily pass through life without knowing about Non-euclidean geometries all though it is fascinating and part of the bedrock of relativity. --Salix alba (talk) 23:46, 2 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK, how about this for a package deal -- add calculus and remove advertising? I strongly prefer that the list not grow.

Also, about Taxman's point about consulting other lists and avoiding reinventing the wheel -- various lists were consulted when the list was orignally created.

Also, so people know, the list is essentially a work list.

Anybody want to help with Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Core topics/Core topics COTF? Maurreen 03:32, 3 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'll try to write a bit on biotech after Wikimania is over. Yes, we could lose advertising into the supplement, I think. Walkerma 03:37, 3 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, the original list included calculus. Maurreen 05:38, 3 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am wondering whether Humor, Continent and Electronics should be redesignated as B class. Maurreen 16:01, 22 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Humour still has a lot of lists as content, and continent has two cleanup tags on it, so I'd hold back on those, though both are close. Electronics does now look like a B to me, though only just. Should I change it? Walkerma 17:56, 22 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Continent has had significant work since August. Perhaps time to reassess. Nurg 10:56, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Physics is the only branch with nine articles. I would like to delete at least Color. Maurreen 16:11, 22 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think color is pretty core, I'd rather not lose it. You could equally well place it under Visual Arts if you want to balance things - or is that just window-dressing? The modern physics description of color tends to be seen as part of a wider meaning, relating to the wavelength of any form of electromagnetic radiation, though an understanding of color comes from physics (Newton playing with a prism, etc.) Walkerma 16:42, 22 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Are you open to either trimming the list to get it closer to 100 or making replacements to get what I would see as more balance between science and other major groups? Here is the count for major branches:

• Culture and society, 15
• Earth, 16
• Humanities, 24
• Life science and medicine, 19
• Mathematics, 7
• Physical science, 23
• Social science, 22
• Technology, 18
• Total – 134

Maurreen 17:05, 22 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

IMHO, there's no problem having 100+ core articles. And science is a fairly important subject and one people frequently look up in an encyclopedia. So I would be against any change. Cedars 12:54, 29 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Do you think W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan are core? The first is FA, the second... not. Adam Cuerden ^talk 21:33, 2 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Unfortunately not! At this level - the top 100-150 articles, you get Music and Theatre and that's it! Even Shakespeare doesn't make it in! I think Opera is in the supplement! If you want to argue a case for these articles being important, you should raise the issue at WP:VA and/or Wikipedia:Core_biographies but even on the latter page there are only 6 entries for Music - Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Elvis, Beatles and Verdi. Note that the importance of the topic doesn't relate to the quality of the article - in fact until we started this project many core articles were in very poor shape. In fact it doesn't matter too much if G&S are on these lists even on our next CD releases we can probably include such articles (Version 0.5 is pretty much closed now, but the next version can probably include them). Congratulations on the new FA! Thanks, Walkerma 22:27, 2 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I ask this because I don't think Talk:Galaxy needs "Please help improve this article as we push to 1.0. If you'd like help with this article, you may nominate it for the core topics collaboration." It's a recently promoted FA! I was thinking of making its appearance contigent on whether or not blah=no, or something.--Rmky87 21:09, 2 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Greetings. I used a perl script to make a list of articles listed as "core topics" that are also tagged with cleanup messages. It's at Wikipedia:Core topics - 1,000/with problems. FYI. – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 15:24, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, we can use this to focus our effort. Cheers, Walkerma 04:34, 16 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is this the right place to point out that the clothing article is a disaster? It's one of the Top 150, and contains minimal citations, bizarre content, lack of mainstream facts, and lots of original research. In addition, it appears to have been written by a registered sex offender with clothing fetishes. I am trying to improve, but need major help!! NuclearWinner 20:03, 13 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks - yes, the article does look poor. I think it got on the CD largely because it was a core topic. Could you perhaps nominate it for the Core Topics collaboration? That way you could enlist some help, though it may take a few weeks. Thanks, Walkerma 04:37, 16 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've been wanting to tackle film for a long time. However, my minimal effort - and I suspect that this is a common issue across most of the core topics - is how exactly to approach articles on such broad subjects without biting off not only more than I can chew but more than I can even comprehend biting into! While I've been able to get some ideas together by looking at the handful of core FAs, it would be nice if perhaps some of the editors behind these successful articles might be able to write a quick guide as to how to face the daunting task of writing a quality core article. Any advice is very much welcome! Thanks, Girolamo Savonarola 06:17, 25 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Great idea! I know I tried working on some, and it's really hard. If you think film is hard, try Humanities! One common feature I've seen is a lot of use of Wikipedia:Summary style. The only problem here is locating "some of the editors behind these successful articles" - there aren't many good broad articles. Nature comes to mind as one that was vastly improved. One other problem I can see is that every article at this level may be unique. Definitely worth a try. Walkerma 21:08, 25 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Something I noticed in the online version of version 0.5 was that the fact that not all articles are included is not only a problem just because you can't click on them and look them up. It is compounded by the fact that articles are written assuming that other articles are available to refer to. A lot of this, such as "see also" links, has been diligently removed, but things still get problematic especially with big articles which covers subtopics which branch out into their own larger articles. This kind of writing also tends to occur in both the best written and the most important topics.

For example, the article on the September 11 attacks contains 13 sections which are started with the {{main}} template in the current revision. In the case of the shorter of these, the sections are more introductory and follow similar style guidelines to lead sections - that is, they omit details which are more appropriate in elaborative sections in the main article, and there is not always such a density of citations, because facts are explained and cited in more detail in the main article.

Is there any current strategy for dealing with this sort of issue? The possible approaches I can see are:

• Accept that WP1.0 will not be as informative or verifiable as the live version
• Wait until articles are at a good enough quality that as many referenced sub-articles are included as possible
• Actually rewrite certain sections for the 1.0 version
• Your alternative idea here

Any thoughts? BigBlueFish (talk) 20:17, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

That is why I have never liked the policy of making everything concise, making more articles. Zginder ^{(talk) (Contrib)} 21:07, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sense is missing from the list. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.223.5.81 (talk) 15:03, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sex is listed as a core topic, but unfortunately can focus on two different classes of things --

• biological sexual reproduction, male/female differences and sex determination in all kingdoms
• human sexuality, human male/female sex differences, human sexual intercourse, gender identity

I've rewritten the entire article with the first aspect in mind, for a couple reasons: it's categorized under biology, and the hatnote for the article had said "This article is about biological sex. For alternate uses, such as sexual intercourse, see Sex (disambiguation)." I'd like to know if (and to what extent) the current article is covering the material envisioned by the core team. Thanks... Madeleine ✉ ✍ 14:44, 11 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

When I last reviewed the article for the Core Topics project, it was mainly about gender. We should probably have both; I may add the sexual intercourse article into the Core Supplement. Thanks, Walkerma (talk) 17:09, 17 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It looks weird to see a country article alongside continent articles, were you conscious of this? It really doesn't match the list. There's a separate article for the continent -- Australia (continent). Madeleine ✉ ✍ 05:30, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

These lists were first put together in 2004, so the article may have changed in scope since then - the intention was to have the continents. Walkerma (talk) 17:10, 17 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think calculus and set theory and major omissions from the core topics. Calculus and set theory are definitely "core" to mathematics. Set theory is essentially the foundation of mathematics. And calculus is essentially the foundation of modern mathematics - and it is essential in everything from astrophysics to electrical engineering to modern medicine. Kevin Baas^talk 16:47, 16 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, these would be important to add. Although this list is supposed to be VERY restrictive - it only covers broad topics (no Shakespeare or Napoleon) - Mathematics doesn't have a huge number of entries. Even in the supplement these two don't show, and I think they belong in the main core. It is fairly academic for our project at this point (our next release will be 20,000-30,000 articles), but I would support adding these two. Walkerma (talk) 17:21, 17 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In that case, I would think that "Probability theory" should be included too. Come to think about it, it might be even more important than set theory. And I've always considered "statistics" to be a subset of probability theory (based on the normal distribution), so I would think it more important than statistics. (The two remaining big ones, IMHO, are trigonometry and information theory, though trig is a pretty small branch.) Kevin Baas^talk 18:03, 17 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think that trig is OK for the top 1000, but not for the top 150-200 topics of all knowledge. As for probability theory, I'd argue that probability (the concept) is more important than the theory describing it (even though I accept that without the theory you wouldn't have the concept). In the same way we have "Atom", not "Atomic theory". And I would suggest that it would belong in the supplement, not in the central core - but we would need to discuss that. Statistics is core, because it is a central theme in many subjects outside mathematics, and it is the more usual term in society (see this). Walkerma (talk) 18:37, 17 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I went ahead and added calculus to the project page (updating the dependent counts), as there is support for it and no opposition. Regarding set theory, what do you think of (set theory vs. set) vs. (mathematical logic vs. logic) vs. discrete mathematics vs. (not core enough) for a core topic? (I see that Logic is already listed under philosophy.) Kevin Baas^talk 14:58, 18 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Folks here may be interested to hear that there was finally some closure on the Core Contest, which was held one year ago. The winners have been announced and will receive their prizes, and more contests are planned in the future. Walkerma (talk) 08:03, 25 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Shouldn't Evolution be a core topic? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 21:42, 22 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It's part of the core supplement, I think that should be OK. Walkerma (talk) 22:44, 30 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to nominate {{Core topic}} for deletion. IMHO, {{WP1.0}} should be used instead; it includes all {{Core topic}}'s functions and a lot of other useful ones. I have recently orphaned {{Core topic}}, but I wanted to bring it up here first. So, does anyone oppose the deletion? Thanks for your input. —Ms2ger (talk) 19:23, 30 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think it should be OK to delete this. This template dates from the time before the WP1.0 template was written. We should update the few pages that still link to it. Thanks, Walkerma (talk) 22:42, 30 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I nominated it. —Ms2ger (talk) 10:15, 8 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think we should demote "Brain" from Core - it's one organ - and put "Evolution" - a truly core subject to biology - in its place. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 12:21, 14 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think I would support that. Evolution would be "promoted" from the supplement to the main core, and brain could be "demoted" to the supplement. Walkerma (talk) 16:51, 14 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good Gary King (talk) 17:57, 14 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I went ahead and did it. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 00:02, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Walkerma (talk) 04:02, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I started making a table of articles, but I'm busy right now and don't have the time to finish it. Here's what I've got so far if anyone feels inclined to work on it. Mr. Absurd (talk) 01:30, 15 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Top-level topic	Second-level topic	Article	Class
Culture and society 15	Business and economics	Advertising	B
		Business	B
		Economics	B
		Money	B
	Everyday life	Clothing	B
		Education	B
		Food	B
		Personal life	Start
		Popular culture	Start/B
	Leisure	Game	B
		Sport	B
		Toy	B
	Miscellaneous	Film	B
		House	Start
		Humour	Start

Someone can write a script to automatically tabulate all of the information. Gary King (talk) 04:32, 15 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, a script like that would be useful, if anyone reading this can do that. It should use the 1.0 teams 10 top-level categories, though. Walkerma (talk) 05:21, 15 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I just noticed a miscount - there were five science miscellaneous articles, not six. I suppose this means there's an extra slot or two (total: 148). Looking at the old list, Australia or Trigonometry seems a good choice. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 14:56, 21 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Might be worth adding to the list. Nergaal (talk) 02:18, 2 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The Elite Nine here are a bit inconsistent with those at Wikipedia:Vital articles/Level/1... I will make a post on the talk page there as well. I think we should build a consensus and have the CORE pages match the VA Level 1 articles. Voyaging (talk) 20:32, 10 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hello and greetings from the maintainers of the WP 1.0 Bot! As you may or may not know, we are currently involved in an overhaul of the bot, in order to make it more modern and maintainable. As part of this process, we will be rewriting the web tool that is part of the project. You might have noticed this tool if you click through the links on the project assessment summary tables.

We'd like to collect information on how the current tool is used by....you! How do you yourself and the other maintainers of your project use the web tool? Which of its features do you need? How frequently do you use these features? And what features is the tool missing that would be useful to you? We have collected all of these questions at this Google form where you can leave your response. Walkerma (talk) 04:23, 27 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]