It is hard to believe it has been over three months since the last issue. We apologize for the hiatus in Signposting. We love publishing it, but are missing a few regular contributors. As a result some regular articles cover only part of recent months, and we can't yet say when the next issue will come out.
Help us return to a regular schedule! We are looking for editors,
news submissions,
and ways to simplify and publish.
If you can help, or at least lob puns from the sidelines, please join us.
Global elections: WMF Board results, FDC voting ends soon
Results of the WMF Board election
Last month, the Wikimedia Foundation held its biannual election for the community-elected seats on its board. Nine candidates participated, with somewhat less on-wiki discussion than in previous years. The results of the election were announced on May 20: 5120 community members voted to elect María Sefidari, Dariusz Jemielniak, and James Heilman, each a current or former WMF Trustee, and each receiving roughly 80% support.
FDC election begins
The annual election for members of the Funds Dissemination Committee, which determines funding allocations for annual plan grants to the largest Wikimedia affiliates, began this week.
Eleven candidates with a wide range of experience, from all six continents, are standing in the election. Along with their candidate statements, they have answered a few questions on the wiki.
Editing contest: The Core Contest is running over six weeks from 00:01 UTC 15 May to 23:59 UTC 30 June 2017. Once again, ₤250 of Amazon vouchers are up for grabs. The contest focusses on improving Wikipedia's core material, with rewards for improving the worst eyesores. C
Wikipedia for Peace: At the beginning of July 2017 volunteers from all over the world will come together to write articles on the topic of persecution and refuge in Berlin, Germany and also visit different projects in Berlin. E
Keysanger (talk·contribs) is warned not to cast aspersions on other editors, or to unnecessarily perpetuate on-wiki battles.
Where the dispute relates specifically to the interpretation of individual military history sources, the Committee recommends that these disputes in this topic area be formally raised at the Military History Wikiproject talkpage to ensure a wider audience and further expert input. Evident manipulation of sources, or disregard of a MILHIST consensus, should be considered disruptive editing and addressed via regular administrative action where appropriate.
Where any content dispute involves both Keysanger (talk·contribs) and MarshalN20 (talk·contribs), those editors must seek wider input by raising the matter at any one of: the Military History Wikiproject talkpage, WP:3O, or WP:RFC. Both editors must abide by any subsequent consensus that arises from this process. Disregard of consensus should be considered disruptive editing and addressed via regular administrative action where appropriate. Nothing in this remedy restricts the editing of the disputed topic area by other editors.
This arbitration case has been closed and the final decision is available at the link above. The following remedies have been enacted:
The community is encouraged to carefully review the lists of items in AWB's "general fixes" and the Checkwiki project's list of errors to determine whether these items are truly uncontroversial maintenance changes. A suggested approach would be classifying existing fixes as cosmetic or non-cosmetic and thereby identifying fixes that should be ineligible to be applied alone. The groups who currently invest their efforts in maintaining these lists are encouraged to improve their change management practices by soliciting broader community input into the value of adding proposed new items to the lists, and specifically to make their proposals accessible to members of the community who are not bot operators or whose interests are non-technical.
The community is encouraged to hold an RfC to clarify the nature of "cosmetic" edits and to reevaluate community consensus about the utility and scope of restrictions on such edits. The committee notes that an RfC on this topic is currently under development.
While the Arbitration Committee has no direct authority over the volunteer developers of open-source tools, we encourage the AWB developers to carefully consider feedback gathered in this case in order to use technical means to avoid problematic edits more effectively.
Magioladitis is restricted from making any semi-automated edits which do not affect the rendered visual output of a page. This restriction does not apply to edits which address issues related to accessibility guidelines. Further, Magioladitis may seek consensus to perform a specific type of semi-automated edit that would normally fall under this restriction at the administrators' noticeboard. Any uninvolved administrator may close such a discussion with consensus to perform a specific type of semi-automated edit. All discussions should be logged on the case page, regardless of outcome.
Magioladitis is reminded that performing the same or similar series of edits in an automated fashion using a bot and in a semi-automated fashion on his main account is acceptable only as long as the edits are not contentious. Should Yobot be stopped or blocked for a series of edits, Magioladitis may not perform the same pattern of edits via semi-automated tools from his main account where this might reasonably be perceived as evading the block. In this circumstance, Magioladitis (like any other editor) should await discussion and consensus as to whether or not the edits are permissible and useful, and resume making such edits through any account only if and when the consensus is favorable.
Magioladitis is restricted from unblocking their own bot when it has been blocked by another administrator. After discussion with the blocking administrator and/or on the bot owners' noticeboard, the blocking administrator or an uninvolved administrator may unblock the bot.
In the 9th edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica, editor Thomas Spencer Baynes introduced the convention of including a person's birth and death year after their name in all biographical articles:
CAMPBELL, John, LL.D. (1708–1775), a miscellaneous author, was born at Edinburgh, March 8, 1708.
This allowed a reader to more easily distinguish between the 100+ notable people named John Campbell (only one of whom was actually lucky enough to get an article in the 9th edition). Although this convention was a bit awkward and redundant, it served a useful purpose (in the absence of disambiguation pages), and was kept in all subsequent editions.
When Wikipedia was created in 2001, it sought to emulate the successful model of the Encyclopædia Britannica and many editors adopted the convention of including birth and death years in the lead sentence.[1] Here is the lead sentence for Christopher Columbus as it appeared on June 13, 2001:
Christopher Columbus (1451?–1506) was a probably Genovian sailor who crossed the Atlantic in service of Spain.
Little did Thomas Spencer Baynes realize, Wikipedia editors would eventually expand on his convention, including not only birth and death years, but entire birth and death dates, birth and death dates in alternate calendars, birth and death locations, alternate names, maiden names, foreign names, pronunciations, foreign pronunciations, and transliterations. Fifteen years later, here's what Christoper Columbus's lead sentence had become:
Christopher Columbus (/kəˈlʌmbəs/; Ligurian: Cristoffa Combo; Italian: Cristoforo Colombo; Spanish: Cristóbal Colón; Portuguese: Cristóvão Colombo; Latin: Christophorus Columbus; born between 31 October 1450 and 30 October 1451 in Genoa – died on 20 May 1506 in Valladolid) was an Italian explorer, navigator, colonizer, and citizen of the Republic of Genoa.
What began as a concise, encyclopedic sentence had slowly grown into a sprawling mess of multiplying metadata—a sentence so complicatingly packed as to render it unreadable.[2] This isn't just a subjective opinion, either. If you chart the Flesch Reading Ease score of the sentence over the years, you'll see an almost continuous decline since 2002. This is by no means an isolated example, either. The metadata virus has spread from biographical articles to other subjects as well, like geography:
The problem has become so noticeable that many reusers of Wikipedia content (including the WMF itself) have started stripping out parenthetical phrases from the lead sentence in certain contexts. If you search for "Christopher Columbus" on Google, you'll see a much more digestible description, both in the Knowledge Graph and under the Wikipedia search result. If you turn on the Page Previews beta feature in your preferences and hover over Christopher Columbus, you'll also see a much shorter version. The Wikipedia apps even experimented with removing parenthetical phrases from the lead sentences in the articles themselves. This has led to heateddebates about whether or not we are potentially removing important information (as some parenthetical phrases consist of content other than metadata). Without a clear way to identify which parenthetical phrases are useful and which are detrimental, I'm sure these issues will remain unresolved. What's really needed is a vigorous debate by the Wikipedia community about how to bring this problem under control and make our articles readable again.
If we don't take significant steps to address this problem, the metadata disease is only going to keep multiplying and spreading. If left unchecked, I fear this is what our future will look like:
[Excerpt from the Americapedia article about Wikipedia, copyright 2034, used with permission.]
...Like frogs in a pot of boiling water, the proliferation of lead sentence metadata happened so slowly that no one noticed until 2021 when John Seigenthaler's son published a devastating video on ClickNews in which he read aloud the lead sentence of his Wikipedia article, and then wept for 3 minutes.
Seigenthaler's video caught the attention of the recently re-elected Donald Trump, who only weeks before had dissolved The New York Times and Washington Post by executive order. Trump immediately posted a flurry of tweets eviscerating the venerable online encyclopedia. By the next day, Wikipedia was no more.
Let's avoid this sorry fate and make Wikipedia great again!
^German Wikipedia also adopted the convention of preceding all death dates with a dagger (called a "Kreuz" in German), which has led to endless debates about whether or not the symbol is Christian and thus inappropriate to use for non-Christian biographies. Luckily, such a convention doesn't seem to exist in English encyclopedias!
This Signpost "Featured content" report covers material promoted from 19 February to 20 May. Text may be adapted from the respective articles and lists; see their page histories for attribution.
Æthelflæd(nominatedbyDudley Miles) (died 918), ruled Mercia in the English Midlands from 911 until her death. She was the eldest daughter of Alfred the Great, king of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex, and his wife Ealhswith. Æthelred and Æthelflæd fortified Worcester, gave generous donations to Mercian churches and built a new minster in Gloucester. Æthelred's health probably declined early in the next decade, after which it is likely that Æthelflæd was mainly responsible for the government of Mercia. Æthelred died in 911 and Æthelflæd then ruled Mercia as Lady of the Mercians. The accession of a female ruler in Mercia is described by the historian Ian Walker as "one of the most unique events in early medieval history".
The Piano Concerto No. 24(nominatedbySyek88) in C minor, K. 491, is a concerto composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart for keyboard and orchestra. Mozart composed the concerto in the winter of 1785–1786, finishing it in March 1786, three weeks after the completion of the Piano Concerto in A major. He premiered the work in early April 1786 at the Burgtheater in Vienna. Chronologically the work is the 20th of Mozart's 23 original piano concertos. The work is one of Mozart's most advanced compositions in the concerto genre. Its early admirers included Ludwig van Beethoven and Johannes Brahms. Musicologist Arthur Hutchings considered it to be Mozart's greatest piano concerto.
Nyuserre Ini(nominatedbyIry-Hor) was an Ancient Egyptian pharaoh, the sixth ruler of the Fifth Dynasty during the Old Kingdom period. He is credited with a reign of 24 to 35 years depending on the scholar, and likely lived in the second half of the 25th century BCE. He was the most prolific builder of his dynasty, having built three pyramids for himself and his queens and a further three for his father, mother and brother, all in the necropolis of Abusir. He built the largest temple to the sun god Ra constructed during the Old Kingdom, named Shesepibre, or "Joy of the heart of Ra". He also completed the Nekhenre, the Sun temple of Userkaf in Abu Gorab, and the valley temple of Menkaure in Giza.
Nemegtomaia(nominatedbyFunkMonk) is a genus of oviraptorid dinosaur from what is now Mongolia that lived in the Late Cretaceous Period, about 70million years ago. The first specimen was found in 1996, and became the basis of the new genus and species N. barsboldi in 2004. The original genus name was Nemegtia, but this was changed to Nemegtomaia in 2005, as the former name was preoccupied. The first part of the generic name refers to the Nemegt Basin, where the animal was found, and the second part means "good mother", in reference to the fact that oviraptorids are known to have brooded their eggs. The specific name honours the palaeontologist Rinchen Barsbold. Two more specimens were found in 2007, one of which was found on top of a nest with eggs, but the dinosaur had received its genus name before it was found associated with eggs.
Jun'yō(nominatedbySturmvogel 66) was a Hiyō-class aircraft carrier of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN). She was laid down as the passenger liner Kashiwara Maru, but was purchased by the IJN in 1941 while still under construction and converted into an aircraft carrier. Completed in 1942, the ship participated in the Aleutian Islands Campaign the following month and in several battles during the Guadalcanal Campaign later in the year. Her aircraft were used from land bases during several battles in the New Guinea and Solomon Islands Campaigns. She was torpedoed in 1943 and spent three months under repair. She was damaged by several bombs during the Battle of the Philippine Sea in mid-1944, but quickly returned to service. Lacking aircraft, she was used as a transport in late 1944 and was torpedoed again in December. Jun'yō was under repair until March 1945, when work was cancelled as uneconomical. She was then effectively hulked for the rest of the war. After the surrender of Japan in September, the Americans also decided that she was not worth the cost to make her serviceable for use as a repatriation ship, and she was broken up in 1946–1947.
The yellow-faced honeyeater(nominatedbyCasliber) (Caligavis chrysops) is a medium-small bird in the honeyeater family, Meliphagidae. Its loud clear call often begins twenty or thirty minutes before dawn. It is widespread across eastern and south eastern Australia. Comparatively short-billed for a honeyeater, it is thought to have adapted to a diet of flies, spiders, and beetles, as well as nectar and pollen from the flowers of plants, and soft fruits. It catches insects in flight as well as gleaning them from the foliage of trees and shrubs. While some yellow-faced honeyeaters are sedentary, hundreds of thousands migrate northwards between March and May to spend the winter in southern Queensland and return in July and August to breed in southern New South Wales and Victoria. They form socially monogamous pairs and lay two or three eggs in a delicate cup-shaped nest.
Fantasy Book(nominatedbyMike Christie) was a semi-professional American science fiction magazine that published eight issues between 1947 and 1951. The editor was William Crawford, and the publisher was Crawford's Fantasy Publishing Company, Inc. Crawford had problems distributing the magazine, and his budget limited the quality of the paper he could afford and the artwork he was able to buy, but he attracted submissions from some well-known writers, including Isaac Asimov, Frederik Pohl, and A.E. van Vogt. The best-known story to appear in the magazine was Cordwainer Smith's first sale, "Scanners Live in Vain", which was later included in the first Science Fiction Hall of Fame anthology, and is now regarded as one of Smith's finest works.
The white-rumped swallow(nominatedbyRileyBugz) (Tachycineta leucorrhoa) is a species of bird in the family Hirundinidae. First described and given its binomial name by French ornithologist Louis Vieillot in 1817, it was for many years considered a subspecies of the Chilean swallow. The species is monotypic with no known population variations. The white-rumped swallow is solitary and nests in distributed pairs during the breeding season. The breeding season is from October to December in Brazil and from October to February in neighboring Argentina. Usually only one brood with four to seven eggs is laid, although a second one will occasionally be laid. The female incubates the eggs over a period usually between 15 and 16 days, with the fledging after usually between 21 and 25 days.
Henry Conwell(nominatedbyCoemgenus) (c. 1748–1842) was an Irish-born Catholic bishop in the United States. He became a priest in 1776 and served in that capacity in Ireland for more than four decades. After the Pope declined to appoint him Archbishop of Armagh, he was instead installed as the second Bishop of Philadelphia in 1819. Conwell took up the post at an advanced age, and spent much of his time there feuding with the lay trustees of his parishes, especially those of St. Mary's Church in Philadelphia. When Conwell removed and excommunicated William Hogan, a controversial priest at St. Mary's, the parish trustees instead rejected Conwell's authority, creating a minor schism. The two sides partially reconciled by 1826, but the Vatican hierarchy believed Conwell had ceded too much power to the laymen in the process, and recalled him to Rome.
The Oran fatwa(nominatedbyHaEr48) was a responsum fatwa, or an Islamic legal opinion, issued in 1504 to address the crisis that occurred when Muslims in the Crown of Castile were forced to convert to Christianity in 1500–1502. The fatwa sets out detailed relaxations of the sharia requirements, allowing the Muslims to conform outwardly to Christianity and perform acts that are ordinarily forbidden in Islamic law, when necessary to survive. It includes relaxed instructions to fulfill the ritual prayers, the ritual charity and the ritual ablution, and recommendations when obliged to violate Islamic law, such as worshipping as Christians, performing blasphemy, and consuming pork and wine.
Ben Crosby(nominatedbyA Texas Historian) (1868–1892) was an American football player, coach, and law student. Crosby attended Yale University beginning in 1889; while there, he was a popular student and sportsman. He was a two-year starter on the football team and a backup on the crew team. After graduation he enrolled at the New York Law School. Crosby was invited in 1892 to serve as head coach of the United States Naval Academy football program. He accepted the position, and, using unusually rigorous practicing strategies, led the team to a 5–2 record, culminating in an upset victory over rival Army in the Army–Navy Game. He received commendation for the victory, including a gift of a personalized trophy.
Operation Pamphlet(nominatedbyNick-D) was a World War II convoy operation conducted during January and February 1943 to transport the Australian Army's 9th Division home from Egypt. The convoy involved five transports, which were protected from Japanese warships during their trip across the Indian Ocean and along the Australian coastline by several Allied naval task forces. No contact was made between Allied and Japanese ships, and the 9th Division arrived in Australian ports during late February with no losses from enemy action.
Archie vs. Predator(nominatedbyArgento Surfer) is a comic book and intercompany crossover, written by Alex de Campi and drawn by Fernando Ruiz. It was originally published as a four-issue limited series in the United States by Dark Horse Comics and Archie Comics in 2015. The single issues were released between April and July, and a hardcover collection went on sale in November 2015. In Archie vs. Predator, a trophy-hunting alien arrives on Earth and begins stalking high school student Archie Andrews and his classmates. After a number of teenagers have been killed, the survivors realize they are being hunted and decide to fight back. Once the predator succeeds in killing Archie, it reveals it was motivated by a crush on one of Archie's girlfriends, Betty Cooper. The book received positive reviews from critics, who enjoyed the strange matchup and dark humor. The miniseries was the bestselling book for both publishers during its release and won a Ghastly Award for Best Limited Series.
The Rodrigues parrot(nominatedbyFunkMonk) (Necropsittacus rodricanus) is an extinct species of parrot that was endemic to the Mascarene island of Rodrigues. It is unclear to which other species it is most closely related, but it is classified as a member of the tribe Psittaculini, along with other Mascarene parrots. The Rodrigues parrot bore similarities to the broad-billed parrot of Mauritius, and may have been related. Two additional species have been assigned to its genus based on descriptions of parrots from the other Mascarene islands, but their identities and validity have been debated.
The CMLL World Heavyweight Championship(nominatedbyMPJ-DK) is a professional wrestling world heavyweight championship established in 1991 and promoted by Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL). CMLL introduced the championship to signal their independence from the National Wrestling Alliance, whose titles they had continued to promote after leaving the alliance in the late 1980s. The Heavyweight Championship was the first CMLL title to be created, and the inaugural champion was Konnan el Bárbaro. The current champion is Máximo Sexy, the fifteenth overall person to hold the championship and the eighteenth overall champion.
Interstate 675(nominatedbyImzadi1979) (I-675) is an auxiliary Interstate Highway in the US state of Michigan. The freeway is a 7.7 mi (12.4 km)* loop route through downtown Saginaw, as Interstate 75 passes on the east side of the city. Construction of I-675 started in 1969 and the freeway opened in 1971. Since then, sections near downtown were reconstructed from 2009 through 2011 to update one of the freeway's interchanges and rebuild the bridge over the Saginaw River.
The North Eastern Railway War Memorial(nominatedbyHJ Mitchell) is a First World War memorial in York, England. It was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens to commemorate employees of the North Eastern Railway who left to fight in the First World War and were killed while serving. It was unveiled in 1924 by Field Marshal Lord Plumer. It consists of a 54 ft (16 m) high obelisk which rises from the rear portion of a three-sided screen wall. The wall forms a recess in which stands Lutyens' characteristic Stone of Remembrance. The wall itself is decorated with several carved swags and wreaths. The memorial is a grade II* listed building, and is part of a "national collection" of Lutyens' war memorials.
The Pilgrim Tercentenary half dollar(nominatedbyWehwalt) was a commemorative fifty-cent coin struck by the United States Bureau of the Mint in 1920 and 1921 to mark the 300th anniversary of the arrival of the Pilgrims in North America. After a promising start, sales tailed off, and tens of thousands of coins from each year were returned to the Philadelphia Mint for melting. Numismatist Q. David Bowers has cited the fact that the coins were struck in a second year as the start of a trend to force collectors to buy more than one piece in order to have a complete set.
August Meyszner(nominatedbyPeacemaker67) (1886–1947) was an Austrian gendarmerie officer, right-wing politician, and senior Ordnungspolizei officer who held the post of Higher SS and Police Leader in the German-occupied territory of Serbia from 1942 to 1944, during World War II. He has been described as one of Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler's most brutal subordinates.
Project Y(nominatedbyHawkeye7) was a secret laboratory established by the Manhattan Project and operated by the University of California during World War II. Its mission was to design and build the first atomic bombs. Robert Oppenheimer was its first director, from 1943 to 1945, when he was succeeded by Norris Bradbury. For scientists freely to discuss their work while preserving security, the laboratory was located in a remote part of New Mexico.
Courtney Love(nominatedbyDrown Soda) (born 1964) is an American singer, actress, writer, and visual artist. Prolific in the punk and grunge scenes of the 1990s, Love's career has spanned four decades. She rose to prominence as the frontwoman of the alternative rock band Hole, which she formed in 1989. Love has drawn public attention for her uninhibited live performances and confrontational lyrics, as well as her highly publicized personal life following her marriage to Kurt Cobain.
Eve Russell(nominatedbyAoba47) is a fictional character on the American soap opera Passions, which aired on NBC from 1999 to 2007 and on DirecTV in 2007–08. Created by the soap's head writer, James E. Reilly, Eve was played by Tracey Ross for the series' entire run. Eve, part of Passions' Russell family, is introduced as the perfect wife of T. C. Russell and mother of Whitney and Simone. Eve's desperation to conceal all evidence of her past relationship—and child—with Julian Crane leads to the breakup of her marriage and family, especially when her adoptive sister Liz Sanbourne arrives and ruins Eve's life for abandoning her first family.
Other Worlds, Universe Science Fiction, and Science Stories(nominatedbyMike Christie) were three related US magazines edited by Raymond A. Palmer. Other Worlds was launched in 1949 by Palmer's Clark Publications and lasted for four years in its first run, with well-received stories such as "Enchanted Village" by A.E. van Vogt and "Way in the Middle of the Air" by Ray Bradbury. Palmer entered a partnership with a Chicago businessman in 1953, to create Bell Publications, and printed Universe Science Fiction from June 1953. Palmer used the new company to abandon Other Worlds and launch Science Stories, in order to escape from Clark Publications' financial difficulties. Science Stories was visually attractive but contained no memorable fiction. Universe Science Fiction, on the other hand, was drab in appearance, but included some well-received stories, such as Theodore Sturgeon's "The World Well Lost". Palmer's Chicago partner lost interest, so he took over both Science Stories and Universe Science Fiction under a new company. In 1955 he culled both magazines and brought back Other Worlds, numbering the issues to make the new magazine appear a continuation of both the original Other Worlds and also of Universe Science Fiction.
The red-headed myzomela(nominatedbyCasliber) (Myzomela erythrocephala) is a passerine bird of the honeyeater family, Meliphagidae, found in Australia, Indonesia, and Papua New Guinea. It was described by John Gould in 1840. Two subspecies are recognised, with the nominate race M. e. erythrocephala distributed around the tropical coastline of Australia, and M. e. infuscata in New Guinea. At 12 cm (4.7 in), it is a small honeyeater with a short tail and relatively long down-curved bill. It is sexually dimorphic; the male has a glossy red head and brown upperparts and paler grey-brown underparts while the female has predominantly grey-brown plumage.
The 1896 Cedar Keys hurricane(nominatedbyJuliancolton) was a powerful and destructive tropical cyclone that devastated much of the East Coast of the United States, starting with Florida's Cedar Keys, near the end of September 1896. The storm's rapid movement allowed it to maintain much of its intensity after landfall and cause significant damage over a broad area; as a result, it became one of the costliest United States hurricanes at the time.
Carnaby's black cockatoo(nominatedbyCasliber and RileyBugz) is a large black cockatoo endemic to south western Australia. It was described in 1948 by naturalist Ivan Carnaby. Measuring 53–58 cm (21–23 in) in length, it has a short crest on the top of its head. This cockatoo usually lays a clutch of one to two eggs. It generally takes 28 to 29 days for the female to incubate the eggs, and the young fledge ten to eleven weeks after hatching. The young will stay with the family until the next breeding season, and sometimes even longer. With much of its habitat lost to land clearing and development and threatened by further habitat destruction, Carnaby's black cockatoo is listed as endangered by the Federal and Western Australian governments. It is also classified as an endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
John C. Calhoun(nominatedbyDisplay name 99Display name 99) (1782–1850) was an American statesman and political theorist from South Carolina, and the seventh Vice President of the United States from 1825 to 1832. He is remembered for strongly defending slavery and for advancing the concept of minority rights in politics, which he did in the context of defending Southern values from perceived Northern threats. He began his political career as a nationalist, modernizer, and proponent of a strong national government and protective tariffs. By the late 1820s, his views reversed and he became a leading proponent of states' rights, limited government, nullification, and free trade. His beliefs and warnings heavily influenced the South's secession from the Union in 1860–1861.
Hrithik Roshan(nominatedbyFrB.TG) (born 1974) is an Indian actor who appears in Bollywood films. The son of the filmmaker Rakesh Roshan, he has portrayed a variety of characters and is known for his dancing ability. He is one of the highest-paid actors in India and has won many awards, including six Filmfares. Roshan has also performed on stage and debuted on television with Just Dance. He is involved with a number of humanitarian causes, endorses several brands and products and has launched his own clothing line. Roshan was married for fourteen years to Sussanne Khan, with whom he has two children.
Kona Lanes(nominatedbyATS) was a bowling center in Costa Mesa, California, that opened in 1958 and closed in 2003 after 45 years in business. Known for its futuristic design, it featured 40 wood-floor bowling lanes, a game room, a lounge, and a coffee shop that eventually became a Mexican diner. Built during the advent of Googie architecture, its Polynesian Tiki-themed styling extended from the large roadside neon sign to the building's "flamboyant neon lights and ostentatious rooflines". Much of Kona's equipment was sold prior to the demolition; and a portion of the distinctive sign was saved and sent to Cincinnati, Ohio, for display in the American Sign Museum.
The 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état(nominatedbyVanamonde93) was a covert operation carried out by the Central Intelligence Agency that deposed the democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz and ended the Guatemalan Revolution of 1944–1954. Code-named Operation PBSUCCESS, it installed the military dictatorship of Carlos Castillo Armas, the first in a series of U.S.-backed authoritarian rulers in Guatemala.
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde(nominatedbyRL0919) is a four-act play written by Thomas Russell Sullivan in collaboration with the actor Richard Mansfield. It is an adaptation of Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, an 1886 novella by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. The story focuses on the respected London doctor Henry Jekyll and his involvement with Edward Hyde, a loathsome criminal. After Hyde murders the father of Jekyll's fiancée, Jekyll's friends discover that he and Jekyll are the same person; Jekyll has developed a potion that allows him to transform himself into Hyde and back again. When he runs out of the potion, he is trapped as Hyde and commits suicide before he can be arrested. In writing the stage adaptation, Sullivan made several changes to the story; these included creating a fiancée for Jekyll and a stronger moral contrast between Jekyll and Hyde. The changes have been adopted by many subsequent adaptations, including several film versions of the story which were derived from the play.
The North Ronaldsay(nominatedbyTheMagikCow) is a breed of domestic sheep from North Ronaldsay, the northernmost island of Orkney. It belongs to the Northern European short-tailed sheep group of breeds, and has evolved without much cross-breeding with modern breeds. It is a smaller sheep than most, with the rams horned and ewes mostly hornless. It was formerly kept primarily for wool, but now the two largest flocks are feral. The Rare Breeds Survival Trust lists the breed as "vulnerable", with fewer than 600 registered breeding females in the United Kingdom.
Operation Mincemeat(nominatedbyThe Bounder) was a successful British disinformation strategy used during the Second World War. As a deception intended to cover the 1943 Allied invasion of Sicily, two members of British intelligence obtained the body of Glyndwr Michael, a tramp who died from eating rat poison, dressed him as an officer of the Royal Marines and placed personal items on him identifying him as Captain (Acting Major) William Martin. Correspondence between two British generals which suggested that the Allies planned to invade Greece and Sardinia, with Sicily as merely the target of a feint, was also placed on the body.
The golden swallow(nominatedbyRileyBugz) (Tachycineta euchrysea) is a passerine in the swallow family, Hirundinidae. This swallow is an aerial insectivore, foraging for insects at heights that are usually under 20 m (66 ft), and very rarely at heights over 30 m (98 ft). When foraging, it is known to explore most habitats except forests. It is considered to be a vulnerable species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
The York City War Memorial(nominatedbyHJ Mitchell) is a First World War memorial designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens and located in York, England. Proposals for commemorating York's war dead originated in 1919 but proved controversial. Several functional proposals were examined until a public meeting in January 1920 opted for a monument. The city engineer produced a cost estimate and the war memorial committee engaged Lutyens, who had recently been commissioned by the North Eastern Railway (NER) to design their own war memorial, also to be sited in York. Lutyens' first design was approved, but controversy enveloped proposals for both the city's and the NER's memorials. Members of the local community became concerned that the memorials as planned were not in keeping with York's existing architecture, especially as both were in close proximity to the ancient city walls, and that the NER's memorial would overshadow the city's. Continued public opposition forced the committee to abandon the proposed site in favour of one on Leeman Road, just outside the walls, and Lutyens submitted a new design of a War Cross and Stone of Remembrance to fit the location. This was scaled back to the cross alone due to lack of funds.
The Maine Centennial half dollar(nominatedbyWehwalt) is a commemorative coin struck in 1920 by the United States Bureau of the Mint. It was sculpted by Anthony de Francisci, following sketches by an unknown artist from the U.S. state of Maine. Fifty thousand pieces, were struck for release to the public. They were issued too late to be sold at the centennial celebrations in Portland, but eventually the coins were all sold.
Mit Fried und Freud ich fahr dahin(nominatedbyGerda Arendt) is a cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach for use in a Lutheran service. He composed this chorale cantata in Leipzig in 1725 for the feast for the Purification of Mary which is celebrated on 2 February and is also known as Candlemas. The cantata is based on Martin Luther's 1524 eponymous hymn, and forms part of Bach's chorale cantata cycle, written to provide Sundays and feast days of the liturgical year with cantatas based on a related Lutheran hymn.
The white-naped xenopsaris(nominatedbySabine's Sunbird) (Xenopsaris albinucha) is a species of suboscine bird in the family Tityridae. The bird is 12.5–13 cm (4.9–5.1 in) in length, with whitish undersides, a black crown and grey-brown upperparts. The sexes are similar in appearance, though the females have duller upperparts. It feeds on insects in the foliage of trees and bushes, and sometimes on the ground. Nesting occurs in a simple cup nest placed in the fork of a tree. Both parents incubate the eggs and help feed the chicks. When the chicks fledge the parents may divide up the brood to continue helping.
The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction(nominatedbyMike Christie) is a American fantasy and science fiction magazine first published in 1949 by Fantasy House. The first issue was titled The Magazine of Fantasy, but the decision was quickly made to include science fiction as well as fantasy, and the title was changed correspondingly with the second issue. It quickly became one of the leading magazines in the science fiction and fantasy field, with a reputation for publishing literary material and including more diverse stories than its competitors.
The Lion class(nominatedbySturmvogel 66) was a pair of battlecruisers built for the Royal Navy before World War I. Nicknamed the "Splendid Cats", the ships were a significant improvement over their predecessors of the Indefatigable class in terms of speed, armament and armour. These improvements were in response to the German battlecruisers of the Moltke class, which were in turn larger and more powerful than the first British battlecruisers of the Invincible class.
Alan Shepard(nominatedbyJustinTime55 and Hawkeye7) (1923–1998) was an American astronaut, naval aviator, test pilot, and businessman. Shepard saw action with the surface navy during World War II. He became a naval aviator in 1946, and a test pilot in 1950. He was selected as one of the original NASA Mercury Seven astronauts in 1959, and in 1961 he made the first manned Project Mercury flight, MR-3, in a spacecraft he named Freedom 7. His craft entered space, but did not achieve orbit. He became the second person, and the first American, to travel into space, and the first person to manually control the orientation of his spacecraft. In 1971, Shepard commanded the Apollo 14 mission, piloting the lunar module to the most accurate landing of the Apollo missions. At age 47, he became the fifth and oldest person to walk on the Moon, and the only one of the Mercury Seven astronauts to do so. He was Chief of the Astronaut Office from 1963 to 1969, and from 1971 until his retirement from the United States Navy and NASA in 1974. He was promoted to rear admiral in 1971, the first astronaut to reach that rank.
Sino-Roman relations(nominatedbyPericlesofAthens) refer to the mostly indirect contact, flow of trade goods, information, and occasional travelers between the Roman Empire and Han Empire of China, as well as between the later Eastern Roman Empire and various Chinese dynasties. These empires inched progressively closer in the course of the Roman expansion into the ancient Near East and simultaneous Han Chinese military incursions into Central Asia. Mutual awareness remained low and firm knowledge about each other was limited. Only a few attempts at direct contact are known from records.
William T. Stearn(nominatedbyMichael Goodyear) (1911–2001) was a pre-eminent British botanist. He is known for his work in botanical taxonomy and botanical history, particularly classical botanical literature, botanical illustration and for his studies of the Swedish scientist Carl Linnaeus. His best known books are his Dictionary of Plant Names for Gardeners, a popular guide to the Latin names of plants, and his Botanical Latin for scientists. Stearn received many honours for his work, at home and abroad, and was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1957. He is the botanical authority for over 400 plants that he named and described.
SMS Kaiser Friedrich III(nominatedbyParsecboy) was the lead ship of the Kaiser Friedrich III class of pre-dreadnought battleships. She was laid down at the Kaiserliche Werft in Wilhelmshaven in 1895, launched in 1896, and finished in 1898. The ship was armed with a main battery of four 24 cm (9.4 in) guns in two twin gun turrets supported by a secondary battery of eighteen 15 cm (5.9 in) guns. Kaiser Friedrich III was extensively modernized in 1908; her secondary guns were reorganized and her superstructure was cut down to reduce top-heaviness. After returning to service in 1910, she was placed in the Reserve Formation; and spent the next two years laid up, being activated only for the annual fleet maneuvers. Though obsolete, Kaiser Friedrich III and her sister ships served in a limited capacity as coastal defense ships in the V Battle Squadron in the early months of the World War I. By February 1915, she was withdrawn from service and eventually decommissioned in November, thereafter being employed as a prison ship and later as a barracks ship. She was scrapped in 1920.
Andha Naal(nominatedbyKailash29792 and Vensatry) is a 1954 Indian Tamil-language mystery-thriller film, produced by A. V. Meiyappan and directed by Sundaram Balachander. It is the first film noir in Tamil cinema, and the first Tamil film to be made without songs, dance, or stunt sequences. Set in the milieu of World War II, the story is about the killing of a radio engineer Rajan. The suspects are Rajan's wife Usha, the neighbour Chinnaiah Pillai, Rajan's brother Pattabi, Rajan's sister-in-law Hema, and Rajan's mistress Ambujam. Each one's account of the incident points to a new suspect. It was critically acclaimed and was awarded a Certificate of Merit for Second Best Feature Film in Tamil at the 2nd National Film Awards. Despite being a commercial failure at the time of its original release, it has acquired cult status over the years, and is regarded as an important film in Tamil cinema.
Amargasaurus(nominatedbyJens Lallensack) is a genus of sauropod dinosaur from the Early Cretaceous epoch of what is now Argentina. The only known skeleton was discovered in 1984 and is virtually complete, including a fragmentary skull, making Amargasaurus one of the best-known sauropods of its epoch. The animal was small for a sauropod, reaching 9 to 10 m (30 to 33 ft) in length. Most distinctively, it sported two parallel rows of tall spines down its neck and back, taller than in any other known sauropod. It is unclear how these spines appeared in life, because they could have stuck out of the body as solitary structures supporting a keratinous sheath, or, alternatively, could have formed a scaffold supporting a skin sail.
The Cape sparrow(nominatedbyInnotata) (Passer melanurus) is a bird of the sparrow family Passeridae found in southern Africa. A medium-sized sparrow at 14–16 cm (5.5–6.3 in), it has distinctive plumage, including large pale head stripes in both sexes. The species inhabits semi-arid savannah, cultivated areas, and towns, and ranges from the central coast of Angola to eastern South Africa and Swaziland. Three subspecies are distinguished in different parts of its range.
HMS Levant(nominatedbyEuryalus) was a 28-gun sixth-rate frigate of the Coventry class, which saw Royal Navy service against France in the Seven Years' War, and against France, Spain and the American colonies during the American Revolutionary War. Principally a hunter of privateers, she was also designed to be a match for small French frigates, but with a broader hull and sturdier build at the expense of some speed and manoeuvrability. Launched in 1758, Levant was assigned to the Royal Navy's Jamaica station from 1759. The ageing frigate was removed from Navy service in 1779, and her crew discharged to other vessels. She was broken up at Deptford Dockyard in 1780, having secured a total of 31 victories over 21 years at sea.
The Founding Ceremony of the Nation(nominatedby如沐西风 and Wehwalt) is a 1953 oil painting by Chinese artist Dong Xiwen. It depicts Mao Zedong and other Communist officials inaugurating the People's Republic of China at Tiananmen Square in 1949. A prominent example of socialist realism, it is one of the most celebrated works of official Chinese art. The painting was repeatedly revised, and a replica painting made to accommodate further changes, as the leaders it depicted fell from power and later were rehabilitated.
The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H.(nominatedbyBruce1ee) is a 1981 literary and philosophical novella by George Steiner. The story is about Jewish Nazi hunters who find a fictional Adolf Hitler alive in the Amazon jungle thirty years after the end of World War II. The book was controversial, particularly among reviewers and Jewish scholars, because the author allows Hitler to defend himself when he is put on trial in the jungle by his captors. There Hitler maintains that Israel owes its existence to The Holocaust and that he is the "benefactor of the Jews".
Clare Stevenson(nominatedbyIan Rose) (1903–1988) was the inaugural Director of the Women's Auxiliary Australian Air Force, from 1941 to 1946. As such, she was described in 2001 as "the most significant woman in the history of the Air Force". Formed as a branch of the Royal Australian Air Force in 1941, the WAAAF was the first and largest uniformed women's service in Australia during World War II.
Naruto Uzumaki(nominatedby1989) is a fictional character in the anime and manga franchise Naruto, created by Masashi Kishimoto. The eponymous protagonist of the series, he is a teen ninja from the fictional village of Konohagakure. The villagers ridicule Naruto on account of the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox—a malevolent creature that attacked Konohagakure—sealed in his body; despite that, he aspires to become the village's leader, the Hokage. His carefree, optimistic and boisterous personality enables him to befriend other Konohagakure ninja, as well as ninja from other villages. Naruto appears in the series' films and in other media related to the franchise, including video games and original video animations. Naruto's character development has been praised by anime and manga publications, and has drawn scholarly attention. Although some initially saw him as a typical manga and anime protagonist comparable to those in other shōnen manga, others have praised his personality and development as he avoids stereotypes.
Donkey Kong 64(nominatedbyCzar) is a 1999 adventure platform video game for the Nintendo 64 console, and the first in the Donkey Kong series to feature 3D gameplay. As the gorilla Donkey Kong, the player explores the themed levels of an island to collect items and rescue his kidnapped friends from K. Rool. The player completes minigames and puzzles as five playable Kong characters to receive bananas and other collectibles. In a separate multiplayer mode, up to four players can compete in deathmatch and last man standing games. The game received universal acclaim from reviewers and was Nintendo's top seller during the 1999 holiday season, with 2.3 million units sold by 2004. It won the 1999 E3 Game Critics award for Best Platform Game, and multiple awards and nominations from games magazines. Reviewers noted the game's exceptional size and length, but criticized its emphasis on item collection and backtracking.
Operation Bernhard(nominatedbyThe Bounder) was an exercise by the Nazis to forge British bank notes. The initial plan was to drop the notes over Britain to bring about a collapse of the British economy. They successfully duplicated the rag paper used by the British, produced near-identical engraving blocks and broke the algorithm used to create the alpha-numeric serial code on each note. In 1942 the aim was changed to forging money to finance German intelligence operations. Much of the output of the unit was dumped into Lake Toplitz and Grundlsee at the end of the war, but enough went into general circulation that the Bank of England stopped releasing new notes, and issued a new design after the war. The operation has been dramatised in a comedy-drama miniseries Private Schulz by the BBC and in a 2007 Austrian film, The Counterfeiters.
HMS St Vincent(nominatedbySturmvogel 66) was the lead ship of her class of three dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. After commissioning in 1910, she spent her whole career assigned to the Home and Grand Fleets, often serving as a flagship. Aside from participating in the Battle of Jutland in May 1916, during which she damaged a German battlecruiser, and the inconclusive Action of 19 August several months later, her service during World War I generally consisted of routine patrols and training in the North Sea. The ship was deemed obsolete after the war and was reduced to reserve and used as a training ship. St Vincent was sold for scrap in 1921 and broken up the following year.
"Don't Stop the Music"(nominatedbyTomica) is a song recorded by Barbadian singer Rihanna, released worldwide in 2007 as the fourth single from her third studio album, Good Girl Gone Bad. The song was written by Tawanna Dabney and its producers StarGate. It is a dance track that features rhythmic devices used primarily in hip hop music. The song received a number of accolades, including a Grammy Award nomination for Best Dance Recording. "Don't Stop the Music" reached number one in nine countries, was certified gold by the British Phonographic Industry and four times platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America.
INS Vikrant(nominatedbyKrishna Chaitanya Velaga) was a Majestic-class aircraft carrier of the Indian Navy. The ship was laid down as HMS Hercules for the British Royal Navy during World War II, but construction was put on hold when the war ended. India purchased the incomplete carrier in 1957, and construction was completed in 1961. Vikrant was commissioned as the first aircraft carrier of the Indian Navy and played a key role in enforcing the naval blockade of East Pakistan during the Indo-Pakistan War of 1971. In the later years, the ship underwent major refits to embark modern aircraft, before being decommissioned in 1997. She was preserved as a museum ship until 2012. In 2014, the ship was sold through an online auction and scrapped after final clearance from the Supreme Court.
T3(nominatedbyPeacemaker67) was a sea-going torpedo boat that was operated by the Royal Yugoslav Navy between 1921 and 1941. Originally 78 T, a 250t-class torpedo boat of the Austro-Hungarian Navy built in 1914, she saw active service during World War I, performing convoy, escort and minesweeping tasks, anti-submarine operations and shore bombardment missions. Following Austria-Hungary's defeat in 1918, she was allocated to the Navy of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, and was renamed T3. The ship was captured by the Italians during the German-led Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941. She served with the Royal Italian Navy under her Yugoslav designation, although she was only used for coastal and second-line tasks. Following the Italian capitulation in 1943, she was captured by Germany, and she served with the German Navy or the Navy of the Independent State of Croatia as TA48. She was sunk by Allied aircraft in 1945 while in the port of Trieste.
Nine Stones(nominatedbyMidnightblueowl) is a stone circle near the village of Winterbourne Abbas in Dorset. Archaeologists believe that it was likely erected during the Bronze Age. The Nine Stones is part of a tradition of stone circle construction that spread through much of Britain, Ireland, and Brittany during the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age. The purpose of such monuments is unknown, although archaeologists speculate that they were likely religious sites, with the stones perhaps having supernatural associations for those who built the circles. It has a diameter of 9.1 metres by 7.8 metres (29 feet 10 inches by 25 feet 11 inches) and consists of nine irregularly spaced sarsen megaliths. Two of the stones on the north-western side of the monument are considerably larger than the others. This architectural feature has parallels with various stone circles in south-western Scotland, and was potentially a deliberate choice of the circle's builders, to whom it may have had symbolic meaning.
The Chase(nominatedbyBcschneider53) is an American television quiz show based on the British program of the same name. The show premiered in 2013, on the Game Show Network. It is hosted by Brooke Burns, and features Mark Labbett as the "chaser". It received positive critical reception; Burns and Labbett earned positive reviews for their roles, and one critic praised the series for avoiding a slow pace in gameplay. Both the series and Burns received Daytime Emmy Award nominations; the series was nominated in 2014 for Outstanding Game Show, and Burns two years later for Outstanding Game Show Host.
Simone Russell(nominatedbyAoba47) is a fictional character on the American soap opera Passions, which aired on NBC from 1999 to 2007 and on DirecTV in 2007–2008. A member of the Russell family, Simone is introduced as the youngest daughter of Eve Russell and T. C. Russell, and the younger sister of Whitney Russell. Her early appearances center on her love triangle with Chad Harris-Crane and her sister Whitney; the character later gains more prominence on the show through her experience coming out as a lesbian to her family, and her relationship with Rae Thomas. Simone's storyline made daytime television history when Passions became the first soap opera to show two women having sex. The character was also daytime television's first African-American lesbian.
Operation Grandslam(nominatedbyIndy beetle) was an offensive undertaken by United Nations peacekeeping forces from 1962 to 1963 against the gendarmerie of the State of Katanga, a secessionist state from the Republic of the Congo in central Africa. The Katangese forces were decisively defeated and Katanga was forcibly reintegrated into the Congo.
Phantasmagoria(nominatedbyHunter Kahn and GamerPro64) is a point-and-click adventure game designed by Roberta Williams for MS-DOS and Microsoft Windows. Released by Sierra On-Line in 1995, it tells the story of Adrienne Delaney, a writer who moves into a remote mansion and finds herself terrorized by supernatural forces. Made at the peak of popularity for interactive movie games, Phantasmagoria features live-action actors and footage, both during cinematic scenes and within the three-dimensional rendered environments of the game itself. Upon release, it was noted for its graphic gore, violence, and sexual content.
Resident Evil 5(nominatedbyFreikorp) is a third-person shooter video game developed and published by Capcom and released in 2009. It is the seventh major installment in the Resident Evil series. The plot involves an investigation of a terrorist threat by Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance agents Chris Redfield and Sheva Alomar in Kijuju, a fictional region of Africa. Redfield soon learns that he must confront his past in the form of an old enemy, Albert Wesker, and his former partner, Jill Valentine. It had a mostly positive reception, although it was criticized for problems with its controls. The game received some initial complaints of racism, but an investigation by the British Board of Film Classification found the complaints were unsubstantiated.
Waiting(nominatedbyNumerounovedant) is a 2015 Indian comedy-drama film directed by Anu Menon. It focuses on the relationship between two people from different walks of life who befriend each other in a hospital, while nursing their respective comatose spouses. The film was released theatrically in India in 2016. Upon release in India, Waiting was well-received by critics with particular praise for the performances of Kalki Koechlin and Naseeruddin Shah, and Menon's direction.
Morihei Ueshiba(nominatedbyYunshui) (1883–1969) was a martial artist and founder of the Japanese martial art of Aikido. He is often referred to as "the founder" or "Great Teacher". After Ueshiba's death, aikido continued to be promulgated by his students. It is now practiced around the world.
The Fade Out(nominatedbyArgento Surfer) is a crime comic created by writer Ed Brubaker and artist Sean Phillips with the help of colorist Elizabeth Breitweiser and research assistant Amy Condit. Twelve issues were published by Image Comics between 2014 and 2016. The story has been collected into three trade paperback volumes and a single hardcover collection. The story is set in 1948 and stars Charlie Parish, a Hollywood screenwriter suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder and fronting for his blacklisted best friend, Gil. When Charlie wakes from a blackout in the same room as a murdered starlet, he and Gil set out to bring her killer to justice. As they learn more about her troubled past, they find themselves up against powerful Hollywood elites who do not want to upset the status quo.
The X-10 Graphite Reactor(nominatedbyHawkeye7) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, was the world's second artificial nuclear reactor, and the first designed and built for continuous operation. It was built during World War II as part of the Manhattan Project. It was air-cooled, used nuclear graphite as a neutron moderator, and pure natural uranium in metal form for fuel. The reactor went critical in 1943, and produced its first plutonium in early 1944. It supplied the Los Alamos Laboratory with its first significant amounts of plutonium, and its first reactor-bred product. Studies of these samples heavily influenced bomb design.
The Roosevelt dime(nominatedbyWehwalt) is the current dime, or ten-cent piece, of the United States. Struck by the United States Mint continuously since 1946, it displays President Franklin D. Roosevelt on the obverse and was authorized soon after his death in 1945. Chief Engraver John R. Sinnock prepared models, but faced repeated criticism from the Commission of Fine Arts. He modified his design in response, and the coin went into circulation in 1946.
Capella(nominatedbyLithopsian and Casliber) is the brightest star in the constellation of Auriga, the sixth-brightest in the night sky, and the third-brightest in the Northern Celestial Hemisphere after Arcturus and Vega. A prominent star in the winter sky of the Northern Hemisphere, it is circumpolar to observers north of 44°N. Its name meaning "little goat" in Latin, Capella depicted the goat Amalthea that suckled Zeus in classical mythology. The Capella system is relatively close, at only 42.8 ly (13.1 pc) from the Sun.
The banded stilt(nominatedbyCasliber) (Cladorhynchus leucocephalus) is a nomadic wader of the stilt and avocet family Recurvirostridae native to Australia. It belongs to the monotypic genus Cladorhynchus. Breeding is triggered by the filling of inland salt lakes by rainfall, creating large shallow lakes rich in tiny shrimp on which the birds feed. Banded stilts migrate to these lakes in large numbers and assemble in large breeding colonies. The female lays three to four eggs on a scrape. If conditions are favourable, a second brood might be laid, though if the lakes dry up prematurely the breeding colonies may be abandoned.
In 1851, teams from Van Diemen's Land and Port Phillip, Victoria, played the first cricket match(nominatedbyLourdes and Sarastro1) between two Australian colonies, recognised in later years as the initial first-class cricket match in Australia. It took place at the Launceston Racecourse in Tasmania. The match was incorporated into celebrations marking the separation of the Port Phillip District from New South Wales in 1851 as the colony of Victoria. Van Diemen's Land won by 3 wickets.
The St Vincent-class battleships(nominatedbySturmvogel 66) were a group of three dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. The sister ships spent their entire careers assigned to the Home and Grand Fleets. Aside from participating in the Battle of Jutland in May 1916 and the inconclusive Action of 19 August several months later, their service during the First World War generally consisted of routine patrols and training in the North Sea. Vanguard was destroyed in 1917 by a magazine explosion. The remaining pair were obsolete by the end of the war, and spent their remaining time either in reserve or as training ships before being sold for scrap in the early 1920s.
Oregon Caves National Monument and Preserve(nominatedbyFinetooth) is a protected area in the northern Siskiyou Mountain of Oregon in the United States. The 4,554 acres (1,843 ha) park, including the marble cave, is 20 mi (32 km) east of Cave Junction. The protected area, managed by the National Park Service is in southwestern Josephine County, near the Oregon–California border. Activities at the park include cave touring, hiking, photography, and wildlife viewing. One of the park trails leads through the forest to Big Tree, which at 13 ft (4.0 m) is the widest Douglas fir known in Oregon. Lodging and food are available at The Chateau and in Cave Junction.
The Battle of Goodenough Island(nominatedbyAustralianRupert and Hawkeye7) was a battle of the Pacific campaign of World War II. The Allies attacked the Special Naval Landing Force to deny the Japanese the ability to use the island prior to the Buna campaign. "Drake Force" landed on the southern tip of Goodenough Island, and following a short but heavy fight, the Japanese forces withdrew to Fergusson Island. After the battle, Goodenough Island was developed by the Allies and became a major base for operations later in the war.
Philadelphia's municipal election of 1951(nominatedbyCoemgenus) was the first held under the city's new charter, which had been approved by the voters the previous year, and the first Democratic victory in the city in more than a half-century. The positions contested were those of mayor, district attorney, and all seventeen city council seats. Citywide, the Democrats took majorities of over 100,000 votes, breaking a 67-year Republican hold on city government.
Homeworld(nominatedbyPresN) is a real-time strategy video game developed by Relic Entertainment and published by Sierra Studios in 1999 for Microsoft Windows. Set in space, the science fiction game follows the Kushan exiles of the planet Kharak after their home planet is destroyed by the Taiidan Empire in retaliation for developing hyperspace jump technology. The survivors journey with their spacecraft-constructing mothership to reclaim their ancient homeworld of Hiigara from the Taiidan, encountering a variety of pirates, mercenaries, traders, and rebels along the way. In each of the game's levels, the player gathers resources, builds a fleet, and uses it to destroy enemy ships and accomplish mission objectives. The player's fleet carries over between levels, and can travel in a fully three-dimensional space within each level rather than being limited to a two-dimensional plane. Critics praised the game's graphics, unique gameplay elements, and multiplayer system, though opinions were divided on the game's plot and high difficulty. The game sold over 500,000 copies in its first 6 months, and received several awards and nominations for best strategy game of the year and best game of the year.
The Battle of Hochkirch(nominatedbyAuntieruth55) occurred in 1758 during the Seven Years' War. After several weeks of maneuvering for position, an Austrian army commanded by Leopold Josef Graf Daun surprised the Prussian army commanded by Frederick the Great. The Austrian army overwhelmed the Prussians and forced a general retreat. The battle took place in and around the village of Hochkirch, 9 km (6 mi) east of Bautzen, Saxony.
The Royal Yugoslav Air Force (VVKJ) operated the British Hawker Hurricane Mk I(nominatedbyPeacemaker67) fighter aircraft from 1938 to 1941. Between 1938 and 1940, the VVKJ obtained 24 Hurricane Mk I's from early production batches, marking the first foreign sale of the aircraft. Twenty additional aircraft were built by Zmaj under licence in Yugoslavia. When the country was drawn into World War II by the German-led Axis invasion of 1941, a total of 41 Hurricane Mk I's were in service as fighters. They achieved some successes against Luftwaffe aircraft, but all Yugoslav Hurricanes were destroyed or captured during the 11-day invasion. Hurricanes remained in service with the post-war Yugoslav Air Force until the early 1950s.
Joe Warbrick(nominatedbyShudde) (1862–1903) was a Māori rugby union player who represented New Zealand on their 1884 tour to Australia, and later captained the 1888–1889 New Zealand Native football team that embarked on a 107-match tour of New Zealand, Australia and the British Isles. Warbrick effectively retired from rugby after returning from the tour, with the exception of an appearance for Auckland in 1894, and went on to work as a farmer and tourist guide in the Bay of Plenty. In 2008 Warbrick and the Natives were inducted into the World Rugby Hall of Fame.
"Faces"(nominatedbyAoba47) is an episode of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager. It is the 14th episode of the first season and was first broadcast by UPN in 1995. In this episode, a Vidiian scientist named Sulan captures and performs medical experiments on the half-Klingon, half-human B'Elanna Torres. He separates her into a full-blooded Klingon and a full-blooded human to find a cure for a disease. The Voyager crew rescues Torres and restores her to her original state, while she attempts to reconcile with her identity as a half-human half-Klingon.
Monnow Bridge(nominatedbyKJP1) in Monmouth, Wales, is the only remaining fortified river bridge in Great Britain with its gate tower standing on the bridge. Such bridge towers were common across Europe from medieval times, but many were destroyed due to urban expansion, diminishing defensive requirements and the increasing demands of traffic and trade. The historical and architectural importance of the bridge and its rarity are reflected in its status as a Scheduled Monument and a Grade I listed building. The bridge crosses the River Monnow 500 m (1,600 ft) above its confluence with the River Wye.
Tube Alloys(nominatedbyHawkeye7) was a codename of the clandestine research and development programme, authorised by the United Kingdom, with participation from Canada, to develop nuclear weapons during the Second World War. Starting before the Manhattan Project in the United States, the British efforts were kept classified and as such had to be referred to by code even within the highest circles of government.
The Demi-Virgin(nominatedbyRL0919) is a three-act play written by Avery Hopwood. Producer Albert H. Woods staged it on Broadway, where it was a hit during the 1921–1922 season. The play is a bedroom farce about former couple Gloria Graham and Wally Deane, both movie actors, whose marriage was so brief that the press speculated about whether Gloria was still a virgin. She attempts to seduce Wally when they are forced to reunite for a movie, but after playing along he surprises her by revealing that their divorce is not valid. Because it contained suggestive dialog and the female cast wore revealing clothes, the production was considered highly risqué at the time. Reviewers generally panned the play as unfunny and vulgar, and local authorities attempted to censor it. A New York City magistrate ruled the Broadway production was obscene, and obscenity charges were brought against Woods, but a grand jury declined to indict him. The city's Commissioner of Licenses attempted to revoke the theater's license, but this effort was blocked in court.
The Vermont Sesquicentennial half dollar(nominatedbyWehwalt) is a commemorative fifty-cent piece struck by the United States Bureau of the Mint in 1927. The coin was designed by Charles Keck, and on its obverse depicts early Vermont leader Ira Allen. The coins did not sell out; over a fourth of the issue was returned for redemption and melting. The coins sell for at least in the hundreds of dollars today, depending on condition.
Alloxylon pinnatum(nominatedbyCasliber) is a tree of the family Proteaceae found in warm-temperate rainforest of eastern Australia. It has shiny green leaves that are either lobed and up to 30 cm (12 in) long, or spear-shaped and up to 15 cm (5.9 in) long. The prominent pinkish-red flower heads, known as inflorescences, appear in spring and summer; these are made up of 50 to 140 individual flowers arranged in corymb or raceme. These are followed by rectangular woody seed pods, which bear two rows of winged seeds.
Cyclone Althea(nominatedbyJuliancolton) was a powerful tropical cyclone that devastated parts of North Queensland just before Christmas 1971. One of the strongest storms ever to affect the Townsville area, Althea was the fourth system and second severe tropical cyclone of the 1971–1972 Australian region cyclone season. After forming near the Solomon Islands and heading southwest across the Coral Sea, the storm reached its peak intensity with 10-minute average maximum sustained winds of 165 km/h (103 mph). On Christmas Eve, Althea struck the coast of Queensland near Rollingstone, about 50 km (31 mi) north of Townsville. Althea produced copious rainfall over central and western Queensland as it turned toward the southeast, and emerged over open waters. After briefly re-intensifying, the system dissipated.
Wipeout 2048(nominatedbyJaguar) is a racing video game in which players pilot anti-gravity ships around futuristic race tracks. It was developed by Sony Studio Liverpool and published by Sony Computer Entertainment. A launch title for the PlayStation Vita, the game was released in 2012. It is the ninth instalment of the Wipeout series and the last game to be developed by Studio Liverpool before its 2012 closure. Wipeout 2048 is a prequel to the first game in the series, and is set in the years 2048, 2049, and 2050. The game received mainly positive reviews. Critics agreed that its graphics and visuals showcased the power of the PlayStation Vita, but criticised its long loading time and other technical issues.
Nova Scotia is the seventh-most populous province in Canada with 923,598 residents as of the 2016 Census of Population, and the second-smallest province in land area at 52,942 km2 (20,441 sq mi). Nova Scotia's 50 municipalities(nominatedbyHwy43 and Mattximus) cover 99.8% of the territory's land mass, and are home to 98.9% of its population. Unlike the provinces of British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec, which have two-tiered municipality systems, Nova Scotia has a one-tier system of municipalities inclusive of four municipality types – regional municipalities, towns, county municipalities and district municipalities.
David Warner (born 1986) is an Australian cricketer, and the vice-captain of the side. A left-handed opening batsmen, Warner is well known for his "aggressive" batting style. As of February 2017, he has scored 31 centuries for the national team.(nominatedbyVensatry)
In cricket, a five-wicket haul refers to a bowler taking five or more wickets in a single innings. This is regarded as a notable achievement. As of January 2017, eight New Zealand cricketers have taken a five-wicket haul on their debut.(nominatedbyLugnuts and Sahara4u) The first New Zealand player to take a five-wicket haul on Test debut was Fen Cresswell who took six wickets for 168 runs against England in 1949.
The first season of Private Practice(nominatedbyAoba47) a nine-episode American television series created by Shonda Rhimes, ran from September to December 2007. It tells the story of Addison Montgomery, a world-class neonatal surgeon, as she adjusts to her move from Seattle to Los Angeles and a new job at Oceanside Wellness Group, a private medical practice. The episodes also focus on the interpersonal relationships between Addison's co-workers, as well as St. Ambrose Hospital chief of staff Charlotte King. It received generally negative reviews from television critics on its debut, but was nominated for three NAACP Image Awards and one People's Choice Award, and earned one BMI Film & TV Award.
Hi-5 is an Australian children's musical group. They have released(nominatedbySatDis) fifteen studio albums, three compilation albums, one reissue, and three singles. Five of the group's albums have been certified by the Australian Recording Industry Association as gold, platinum and double platinum. Four of their albums have reached the top 10 on the ARIA Albums Chart.
The 2001 Atlantic hurricane season was an above-average Atlantic hurricane season in which fifteen named storms formed. The season officially began in June and ended in November, dates that conventionally delimit the period of each year when most tropical cyclones form in the Atlantic basin. The season's first tropical cyclone, Tropical Storm Allison, formed in June, while the season's final system, Hurricane Olga, dissipated in December. This timeline documents(nominatedbyTropicalAnalystwx13) tropical cyclone formations, strengthening, weakening, landfalls, extratropical transitions, and dissipations during the season. It includes information that was not released throughout the season, meaning that data from post-storm reviews by the National Hurricane Center, such as a storm that was not initially warned upon, has been included.
Will Smith (born 1968) is an American actor and producer. His career(nominatedbyCowlibob) breakthrough came when he played a fictionalised version of himself in the 1990s television sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. The role brought him international recognition and two Golden Globe Award nominations. Two years later, Smith made his film debut in the drama Where the Day Takes You, where he appeared as a disabled homeless man. Since then he has appeared in 28 further films, with Bright currently being in post-production. Smith also produced eighteen films, a television sitcom and a talk show program.
Emma Stone (born 1988) is an American actress who aspired to an acting career(nominatedbyFrB.TG) from an early age. She has appeared in 23 films (with Battle of the Sexes being currently in post-production), 23 television episodes and a music video. Stone has also recorded nine songs for her films, voiced a character in the video game Sleeping Dogs and was part of the 2014 Broadway revival of Cabaret.
The fourth season(nominatedby1989) of the animated comedy series Family Guy aired on Fox from May 2005 to May 2006, and consisted of thirty episodes, making it the longest season to date. The first half of the season is included within the volume 3 DVD box set, which was released in November 2005, and the second half is included within the volume 4 DVD box set, which was released in November 2006. The last three episodes of season 4 were the basis for the movie known as Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, and are edited for content; Fox does not include these episodes in the official episode count.
Naruto is an anime series based on Masashi Kishimoto's manga series of the same name. The series centers on the adventures of Naruto Uzumaki, a young ninja of the Hidden Leaf Village, searching for recognitions and wishing to become Hokage, the ninja that is acknowledged by the rest of the village to be the leader and the strongest of all. The 220 episodes that constitute the series(nominatedby1989) were aired between October 2002 and February 2007 on TV Tokyo in Japan. The English adaption of the episodes were released in North America by Viz Media, and began airing in September 2005 on Cartoon Network's Toonami. In September 2008, Cartoon Network ended its Toonami block, but the channel continued sporadically airing episodes of Naruto in the time slots originally occupied by Toonami's programming till January 2009 when episode 209, the last episode to air in US, was shown.
Oh Land (born 1985) is a Danish singer-songwriter and record producer. She has recorded 88 songs(nominatedbyCarbrera) for four studio albums, an EP and a soundtrack album, and appeared as a featured artist for songs on other artists' releases.
Cardiff City F.C. is a professional association football club based in Cardiff, Wales. The club was founded in 1899 as Riverside A.F.C., by members of a local cricket club, and joined the Cardiff & District League the following year. In 1907, they joined the South Wales Amateur League and changed their name to Cardiff City, later entering the English football pyramid by joining the Southern Football League in 1910. They were elected into the Football League ten years later, where they remain to this day. 191 players have featured in 100 or more first-team matches in all competitions for the club(nominatedbyKosack) since they joined the English football pyramid in 1910, either as a member of the starting eleven or as a substitute. Billy Hardy is the current holder of appearance records in both league matches and all competitions having made 590 appearances in a 20-year spell at the club between 1911 and 1932.
Celtic F.C. is a Scottish association football club based in Glasgow. The club was founded in 1887 and played their first match in 1888. As of the start of 2016–17 season, Celtic have had 18 different full-time managers.(nominatedbyShugSty) Willie Maley, the club's first manager, is the longest to have served in the post, having managed the club from 1897 to 1940. The 30 major honours Maley won during his tenure are the most a manager has achieved at Celtic.
Cambridgeshire is a county in eastern England, with an area of 1,308 square miles (3,390 km2) and a population of 708,719. There are twenty-seven Local Nature Reserves in Cambridgeshire.(nominatedbyDudley Miles) Four are Sites of Special Scientific Interest, and five are managed by the Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire.
Blood-C is a Japanese animated television series which aired twelve episodes(nominatedbyProtoDrake) between July and September 2011. The third project in the Blood franchise, the series follows Saya Kisaragi as she fights monsters called the Elder Bairns. It was directed by Tsutomu Mizushima and produced by Production I.G. The characters were designed by mangaka group Clamp. All episodes were co-written by Clamp member Nanase Ohkawa and Blood+ director Junichi Fujisaku.
Sharon Stone (born 1958) is an American actress, film producer, and former fashion model. She has won 10 awards from 41 nominations(nominatedbyAoba47), including one Emmy Award, one Golden Globe Award, and two MTV Movie Awards. She has also received several "dishonors" for poor performances in films, earning three Golden Raspberry Awards, and two Stinkers Bad Movie Awards.
Fernando Torres (born 1984) is a Spanish international footballer who has represented his country 110 times and scored 33 goals(nominatedbyLiam E. Bekker) since making his debut in 2003. As of February 2017, he is the third top scorer in the history of the national team, with only David Villa and Raúl having scored more goals for the country. Spain have never lost a match in which he has scored.
Abby Wambach (born 1980) is a retired professional soccer player who competed as a forward for the United States women's national soccer team from 2001 to 2015. In 255 appearances for the senior national team, she scored 184 goals(nominatedbyHmlarson) and currently holds the world record for goals scored at the international level by both female and male soccer players.
The Royal Yugoslav Navy included a wide range of vessels during its existence from 1920 to 1945. This list(nominatedbyPeacemaker67) includes all sea-going warships ranging from a light cruiser down to motor torpedo boats, and also includes river monitors that operated on the Danube and other rivers. Large auxiliary vessels such as submarine tenders and tankers are included, but hulks, tugs and smaller auxiliary craft are not.
Eve is an American television sitcom that was broadcast on United Paramount Network from 2003 to 2006. A total of 66 episodes(nominatedbyAoba47) were broadcast over three seasons. Created by Meg DeLoatch, the series follows New York City fashion designer Shelly Williams through her relationship with physical therapist J.T. Hunter. Critical response to Eve was mixed; some critics praised its inclusion as part of UPN's line-up of black sitcoms, while others felt Eve lacked charisma and the series was inferior to other sitcoms.
Nightcrawler is 2014 American thriller film written and directed by Dan Gilroy. The film stars Jake Gyllenhaal as Lou Bloom, a stringer who records violent events late at night in Los Angeles, and sells the footage to a local television news station. The film premiered at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival, before receiving a theatrical release. Nightcrawler received awards and nominations(nominatedbyFamous Hobo) in a variety of categories, with particular praise for Gilroy's screenplay and Gyllenhaal's performance. It has received a total of 22 awards from 76 nominations. The American Film Institute and the National Board of Review included it in their lists of top ten films of the year.
Peter Dinklage (born 1969) is an American actor and producer. Dinklage studied acting(nominatedbyAffeL) at the Bennington College where he starred in a number of amateur stage productions. He made his film debut in the 1995 comedy-drama Living in Oblivion, and made his breakthrough by starring in the comedy-drama The Station Agent. In the same year, Dinklage played the title role in the play Richard III at The Public Theater. He gained international recognition in 2011 with the HBO fantasy drama series Game of Thrones for his portrayal of Tyrion Lannister. In 2017, Dinklage became one of the highest paid actors on television and earned US$1.1 million per episode of Game of Thrones.
Amy Adams (born 1974) is an American actress who has received various awards and nominations(nominatedbyKrish!), including two Golden Globe Awards, four Critics' Choice Awards and a Screen Actors Guild Award. Additionally, she has been nominated for five Academy Awards and six BAFTA Awards. In 2017, Adams received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for her contributions to the motion picture industry.
The Arabian Peninsula is a peninsula between the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea, and the Persian Gulf. There are 57 known tropical cyclones(nominatedbyHurricanehink) that affected the peninsula, primarily Yemen and Oman. These storms have caused at least US$5.7 billion in damage and 1,662 deaths. Most of the tropical cyclones originated in the Arabian Sea, the portion of the Indian Ocean north of the equator and west of India.
Alien, a science-fiction action horror franchise, tells the story of humanity's ongoing encounters with Aliens: a hostile, endoparasitoid, extraterrestrial species. Set between the 21st and 24th centuries over several generations, the film series centers around a character ensemble's(nominatedbyDarthBotto) struggle for survival against the Aliens and against the greedy, unscrupulous megacorporation Weyland-Yutani.
Suriya (born 1975) is an Indian actor and producer who works primarily in Tamil language films. He made a commercially successful cinematic debut in Vasanth's Nerrukku Ner in 1997. Since then, he has appeared(nominatedbySsven2) in thirty-nine further films, with Thaanaa Serndha Koottam being currently under production. He has also produced five films, dubbed the lead role of Guru, narrated The Ghazi Attack and distributed Kadugu.
Vijay (born 1974) is an Indian actor who works in Tamil language films. He made his cinematic debut in the 1984 drama Vetri as a child artist. Since then, he has appeared(nominatedbySsven2) in sixty-seven further films, with Vijay 61 being currently under production.
The locations on the standard British version of the board game Monopoly are set in London(nominatedbyRitchie333 and The Rambling Man) and were selected in 1935 by Victor Watson, managing director of John Waddington Limited. Watson became interested in the board game after his son Norman had tried the Parker Brothers original US version and recommended the company produce a board for the domestic market. He took his secretary Marjory Phillips on a day-trip from the head offices in Leeds to London and the pair looked for suitable locations to use. The London version of the game was successful, and in 1936 it was exported to Continental Europe, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, becoming the de facto standard board in the British Commonwealth.
Shruti Haasan (born 1986) is an Indian film actress, composer and playback singer who works in Telugu, Hindi, and Tamil cinema. Haasan started her career(nominatedbyPavanjandhyala) as a playback singer in the 1992 Tamil film Thevar Magan. She later made a cameo appearance in Hey Ram, but her first major appearance was in Soham Shah's Hindi film Luck in 2009. Since then, she has appeared in twenty-four further films, with Behen Hogi Teri and Sabaash Naidu being currently under production.
Alfred Hitchcock (1899–1980) was an English director and filmmaker. Popularly known as the "Master of Suspense" for his use of innovative film techniques in thrillers, Hitchcock started his career(nominatedbyCowlibob) in the British film industry as a title designer, and art director for a number of silent films during the early 1920s. His directorial debut was the 1925 release The Pleasure Garden. Hitchcock followed this with The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog, his first commercial and critical success. During his career he directed sixty-one films, wrote the script for twelve films, and produced 22 films. He also hosted two television series and directed twenty television episodes.
Naruto: Shippuden is an anime series adapted from Part II of Masashi Kishimoto's manga series, with exactly 500 episodes(nominatedby1989). It is set two and a half years after Part I in the Naruto universe, following the ninja teenager Naruto Uzumaki and his allies. The series is directed by Hayato Date, and produced by Studio Pierrot and TV Tokyo. It began broadcasting in 2007 on TV Tokyo, and concluded in 2017.
The plot of the Naruto manga series, written and illustrated by Masashi Kishimoto, is divided in two; the second part is known as Part II. The series is about the eponymous character Naruto Uzumaki who wants recognition and respect from the fellow villagers, and to become the Hokage, the leader of Konohagakure. Part II follows the return of the ninja Naruto Uzumaki to Konohagakure from two-and-a-half years of training. As he returns, he continues his goal to convince his best friend Sasuke Uchiha to return with him and his other friends to Konohagakure. Naruto was published in individual chapters by Shueisha in Weekly Shōnen Jump and later collected in tankōbon format with extra content. Volume 49 was published in 2010, and the final volume, 72, was published in 2015.(nominatedby1989)
The 2014 Tour de France was the 101st edition of the race, one of cycling's Grand Tours. The race was contested by 198 riders from 22 teams(nominatedbyBaldBoris). All of the eighteen UCI ProTeams were automatically invited, and obliged, to attend the race. The organiser of the Tour, Amaury Sport Organisation, announced that the four second-tier UCI Professional Continental teams were given wildcard invitations.
Dhanush (born 1983) is an Indian film actor, producer, lyricist and singer known for his work in Tamil cinema. He made his acting debut in 2002 with the coming of age drama, Thulluvadho Ilamai. Since then, he has appeared(nominatedbyKailash29792 and [[User:Vensatry]Vensatry]) in thirty-six future films, with three more being currently under production.
The Act of Killing is a 2012 Danish-British-Norwegian documentary film directed by Joshua Oppenheimer, Christine Cynn, and an anonymous Indonesian co-director. The film explores the social significance of the Indonesian mass killings of 1965–1966 by focusing on the perpetrators and having them produce reenactments of the killings in the style of various Hollywood genres. Oppenheimer was struck by the extent to which people not only rationalised but boasted about their participation in the killings, and used the film to explore the role the events continue to play in people's lives in the present. It garnered awards and nominations(nominatedbyRhododendrites) primarily in the Best Documentary category and for Oppenheimer's direction, but also audience awards, special awards, and recognition for Signe Byrge Sørensen's production and editing by Janus Billeskov Jansen and Niels Pagh Andersen.
In baseball, batting average is a measure of a batter's success rate in achieving a hit during an at bat, and is calculated by dividing a player's hits by his at bats. The achievement of a .400 batting average in a season is recognized as "the standard of hitting excellence". Twenty players have recorded a batting average of at least .400 in a single Major League Baseball season(nominatedbyBloom6132) as of 2016.
Tove Lo (born 1987) is a Swedish singer and songwriter. She has written(nominatedbyPaparazzzi) over 70 songs for her two studio albums and one extended play, as well as for other artists.
Cambridgeshire is a county in eastern England, with an area of 339,746 ha (1,311.77 sq mi) and a population of 841,218 as of mid-2015. As of March 2017, there are 99 Sites of Special Scientific Interest in the county(nominatedbyDudley Miles). Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) are designated by Natural England, which is responsible for protecting England's natural environment. Designation as an SSSI gives legal protection to the most important wildlife and geological sites. There are eighty-eight sites listed for their biological interest, ten for their geological interest, and one for both interests.
Baahubali: The Beginning is a 2015 Indian epic historical fiction film written and directed by S. S. Rajamouli and produced by Arka Media Works. A bilingual, made in Telugu and Tamil, the film stars Prabhas, Rana Daggubati, Anushka Shetty, and Tamannaah in lead roles. The first of two cinematic parts, The Beginning opened worldwide to critical acclaim and record-breaking box-office success, becoming the highest grossing film in India and the third-highest grossing Indian film worldwide, and the highest-grossing South Indian film. It garnered several awards and nominations(nominatedbyKrish!) with praise for Rajamouli's direction, cinematography, production design, costumes and performances of the cast members.
Urmila Matondkar (born 1970) is an Indian actress, who appears primarily in Hindi-language films. Apart from her acting, Matondkar has also gained popularity for her dancing skills. She has appeared(nominatedbyKrish!) in sixty-two films (including nine cameo appearances) and nine television series.
The WHO Model List of Essential Medicines(nominatedbyDoc James) contains the medications considered to be most effective and safe to meet the most important needs in a health system. The list, published by the World Health Organization (WHO), is frequently used by countries to help develop their own local lists of essential medicine. The list is divided into core items and complementary items. The core items are deemed to be the most cost effective options for key health problems and are usable with little additional health care resources. The complementary items either require additional infrastructure such as specially trained health care providers or diagnostic equipment or have a lower cost-benefit ratio.
Nanjing Metro is a rapid transit system in the Chinese city of Nanjing, with stations(nominatedbyHaha169) in nine of the city's eleven districts. The system currently spans 257 km (160 mi) and has 128 stations, divided between urban lines and S-train lines. Systemwide, service begins every morning with the earliest train scheduled to depart Yushanlu station and concludes with the final train scheduled to arrive at Maigaoqiao Station.
The United States presidential election of 1880(nominatedbyCoemgenus) was a contest between Republican James A. Garfield and Democrat Winfield Scott Hancock in which the Republican Garfield prevailed. At the Republican convention, supporters of Ulysses S. Grant – James G. Blaine, and John Sherman – deadlocked for thirty-six rounds of voting before settling on Garfield as the nominee. At the Democratic convention, Hancock fended off challenges by Thomas F. Bayard, Samuel J. Randall, and Henry B. Payne for his party's nomination, while James B. Weaver and Neal Dow picked up their small parties' endorsements with little dissent. The voter turnout rate was one of the highest in the nation's history.
The Interstate Highways in Michigan(originally nominatedbyImzadi1979 as a good topic; automatically promoted due to Interstate 675 (Michigan) reaching featured status) are the segments of the national Dwight D. Eisenhower System of Interstate and Defense Highways that are owned and maintained by the U.S. state of Michigan, totaling about 1,239 mi (1,994 km). On a national level, the standards and numbering for the system are handled by the Federal Highway Administration and the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, while the highways in Michigan are maintained by the Michigan Department of Transportation and the Mackinac Bridge Authority.
Russell family(originally nominatedbyAoba47 as a good topic; automatically promoted due to Eve Russell reaching featured status) is a fictional family who appeared on American soap opera Passions, which aired on NBC (1999–2007) and later on DirecTV (2007–08). The family was created by the soap's founder and head writer James E. Reilly; it originally consisted of four characters—the married couple Eve Russell and T. C. Russell, and their children, Whitney and Simone Russell. The Russells are one of the four core families in the fictional town of Harmony, and are characterized by their friendship with the Bennetts and Lopez-Fitzgeralds and their feud with the Cranes. As the series progressed, four more characters were added to the family.
The battlecruisers of the Royal Navy(originally nominatedbySturmvogel 66 as a good topic; automatically promoted due to Lion-class battlecruiser reaching featured status) were first built in the first half of the 20th century. They fought in most of the major ship-to-ship engagements during World War I, including the Battle of Jutland where three were destroyed by magazine explosions. Only three survived the post-war scrap drive to fight in World War II: Hood was sunk by the German battleship Bismarck, Repulse by Japanese aircraft and Renown survived the war only to be scrapped in 1948.
Emma Stone(nominatedbyFrB.TG) (born 1988) is an American actress. One of the world's highest-paid actresses in 2015, Stone has received a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, and three Screen Actors Guild Awards. She appeared in Forbes Celebrity 100 in 2013, and is often described by the media as one of the most talented actresses of her generation.
This Signpost "In the media" report covers media primarily from 19 February to 17 March.
Is Garfield male? Only the Creator knows. A silly edit war erupts.
In one of the more silly Wikipedia editing disputes of all time, an "edit war" over whether the comic strip character Garfield is really male received major press coverage. As evidenced at Garfield's talk page, a semi-well known internet troll found a 2014 interview with Garfield's creator Jim Davis, that said『Garfield is very universal. By virtue of being a cat, really, he’s not really male or female or any particular race or nationality, young or old.』 This springboarded a war over whether Garfield's gender in his infobox should be "none." The whole thing was chronicled in a number of lighthearted press stories, including this one in the Washington Post (which I am partial to because it ends with a dumb quote from me). The faux edit-war was put to a complete end, however, when Davis told the Post: "Garfield is male." (Heat Street (February 27); Washington Post (March 1); Mashable (March 1); New York Magazine (March 1); New York Daily News (March 2); Zet Chilli (March 3, in Polish); NTDTV (March 3, in Chinese); Helsingborgs Dagblad (March 5, in Swedish); Süddeutsche Zeitung (March 9, in German); El Nuevo Diario (March 13, in Spanish); and many more)
In brief
Editathons all over
The Daily Mail's answer to whether it has been treated unfairly by Wikipedia.
The battle for stubs: Slatepublished an op-ed by WMF Trustee Dariusz Jemielniak (speaking only on his own behalf) about how Wikipedia treats short articles in its deletion processes, in a follow-up to Andrea James' piece in Boing Boing covered in our last column. (Slate, March 7)
All-Women edit corps in Mangalore: The Hindureported on a 47-team of all women editors from Mangalore who have created over 300 articles in the Kannada, Tulu, and Konkani language Wikipedias. (March 8).
Detroit edit city A women in the arts edit-a-thon was held in Detroit, Michigan on March 11 as part of the international campaign by Art + Feminism. (Detroit Free Press, March 9)
For women architects, too: The Sydney Morning Heraldhighlighted a group in Australia working to increase the coverage of female architects on Wikipedia. (Sydney Morning Herald, March 17)
The Daily Mail at war: The Daily Mail continues to chafe at its reduced status as a Wikipedia citation source (see last issue's In the media), publishing a long story tilted towards proving unfair treatment. (Daily Mail, March 3)
Wikipedia printouts considered not reliable in court: A case against a torrent site proxy operator in the UK was dismissed, in part because the judge was apparently not happy at the prosecution relying on printouts from Wikipedia to explain what a reverse proxy actually is. (Torrent Freak, March 7)
Right to forget watch: A bill introduced to the New York State Assembly would attempt to secure a "right to be forgotten" that would require censorship of Wikipedia and other sites. Writing on his Volokh Conspiracy blog, law professor Eugene Volokh concludes that the bill is unconstitutional on its face. (Washington Post, March 15)
Vandal watch: Among the usual press coverage of recent vandalism on the articles of public figures, the Houston Chroniclenoted recent trolling of U.S. Congressman Louie Gohmert's article. (Houston Chronicle, March 17) Another source described the vandal edits as a "hack", which is no doubt a sexy word to use in a headline, although Wikipedia editors know that malicious edits required no hacking skills or really any skills whatsoever, aside from the occasional creative flair seen in Garfieldgate. (Roll Call, March 15)
My BLP is awesome if I say so myself: Utah State Representative Mike Winder has been reported to have used multiple Wikipedia accounts to create and primp up his own biography. (Salt Lake Tribune, March 14)
Response to Wikipedia has cancer: A popular Reddit thread reviewed Guy's provocative Signpost editorial from February, raising concerns about Wikimedia's spending growth. That thread, and a similar review published in Quartz, concluded that Wikimedia is healthy for a non-profit, and remains efficient compared to libraries and publishers. (Quartz, May 8)
Do you want to contribute to "In the media" by writing a story or even just an "in brief" item? Edit next week's edition in the Newsroom or contact the editor.
A paper titled "Even Good Bots Fight: The case of Wikipedia"[1] describes a quantitative analysis of the reverting behavior of bots across different wikis. The paper has been popular in the tech media, with interviews from Dr. Yasseri (last author) appearing in Wired[supp 1], Sputnik[supp 2] and the BBC,[supp 3] among other media outlets. Regretfully, the authors failed to consider nature of "conflict" and whether it was actually conflict they were measuring, and it's too late to get the story right in the popular press.
Through their analysis, the authors report that bots often get into "conflict": "[...] bots on English Wikipedia reverted another bot on average 105 times, which is significantly larger than the average of 3 times for humans". The authors assume that all revert actions represent "conflict" and conclude that the large number of reverts they discover imply "continuous disagreement" and that the activities are "inefficient as a waste of resources [...]". They observe the raw number of reverts that bots do to each other across wikis and conclude that the bots fight more in German Wikipedia than in Portuguese Wikipedia. Dr. Yasseri is quoted telling reporters for Sputnik news that "There are no normal editors looking after the work being done by these bots and this is one of the reasons of the conflict we see going on between different bots. The main reason for conflicts is lack of central supervision of bots." This assertion, however, is dubious.
It's too bad that Dr. Yasseri doesn't appear to have looked into the Bot Approvals Group that oversees bot activities on English Wikipedia and the many similar groups on other wikis (e.g. the Wikipédia:Robôs/Grupo de aprovação in Portuguese Wikipedia). It would be interesting if these centralized governance strategies were ineffective at preventing bots from getting into conflict.
While reverts between human editors often do represent conflict over which content should appear in an article, the authors do not check that this assumption holds with bots. The paper contains no content analysis that might describe what these "contentious disagreements" look like, beyond a brief statement that much of the reverts happen between bots that were fixing inter-wiki links and are likely no longer a problem since the introduction of Wikidata in 2013. A cursory review of their open-licensed data release suggests that many of these bot-reverts take place years after the original bot edit – and in response to human actions like the renaming of an article (for example, when human user NightstallionmovedMohammad BeheshtitoAyatollah Mohammad Beheshti and RussBot came to fix a redirect from Dr. Mohammad Beheshti in 2006 and then 2 years later, Mohsenkazempurmoved it back and Addbot came back to fix the redirect again, that looks like a bot revert). If the authors had explored what was happening in these reverts and the mechanisms by which wiki communities observe and govern bot behaviors, they might have drawn different conclusions and not referred to this activity as a "fight" or "conflict". While it's certainly true that bot fights do sometimes happen, the authors don't seem to have discovered or described any real phenomena of bot vs. bot "conflict". If they had, they might have told a different story of how rare such fights are and how quickly they are resolved by human editors. Regretfully, it's too late to get the story right with the popular press. "Robot wars in Wikipedia" has proven too juicy of a story to pass up.
This conference paper[2] touches upon a very interesting yet understudied question: psychological dimensions of why people contribute to Wikipedia. The topic of motivations of Wikipedia contributors has been tackled before, but not much research has focused on said psychological aspects, which promise to teach us more about differences between individuals who have potential to become volunteer contributors. The study, based on a sample of Polish students (206 University of Gdańsk students in their early 20s, over half from the pedagogics field, over 80% female), looked at six personality traits (extraversion, openness to experience, conscientiousness, agreeableness, emotional stability and cynical hostility – the first four are also a part of the Big Five personality traits). One of the authors' goals was to test whether cynical hostility would be negatively correlated to editing Wikipedia, and to one's opinion of it. Besides attitudes towards Wikipedia, the study also measured the students' attitude towards traditional encyclopedias, radio, press and TV.
The authors found that conscientiousness was negatively, but weakly, related to editing Wikipedia and to positive opinions about Wikipedia. Cynical hostility was not related to any specific attitude towards Wikipedia. Extraversion and openness to experience were positively, but weakly, related to positive opinions about Wikipedia. The authors suggest that the lack of relation between cynical hostility (distrust of other people) and Wikipedia may exist partially because many students do not associate Wikipedia with the work of other individuals. They noted their findings are not consistent with prior studies; citing a study which suggested that knowledge sharing is related to openness to experience, conscientiousness and agreeableness – though noting that that study was based on sharing knowledge inside a company, an environment that is somewhat different from doing so in the public, volunteer setting of Wikipedia. At the same time, this reviewer notes that the study does not demonstrate any statistically significant Wikipedia-related correlations. Overall, it seems like an interesting study, but with statistically insignificant, inconclusive findings. Whether the studied population was too small, or too biased, is hard to say, but this reviewer hopes future studies will pursue this paper's central question. The psychological dimension of why people contribute, like, or dislike and not contribute to Wikipedia is a very interesting issue. Even with no conclusive findings, this study shows the potential of this topic.
"ExpertIdeas: Incentivizing Domain Experts to Contribute to Wikipedia"
It is generally known that while many experts (professors, etc.) use Wikipedia, they rarely contribute to it (which, generally, is not that different from how non-experts use but don't contribute to it). This preprint[3] presents the results of a randomized field experiment, inspired by social loafing theory, investigating how different incentives could motivate experts to contribute. In the authors' own words: "We investigate incentives that Wikipedia can provide for scholars to motivate them to contribute". The authors (including User:I.yeckehzaare) are familiar enough with the Wikipedia community to be able to create and operate a bot (User:ExpertIdeasBot, approved by the community in 2014); additional resources about this study are available at Wikipedia:WikiProject Economics/ExpertIdeas. The authors sent a number of invitations to 3,974 researchers (from the field of economics). The bot has been operating roughly from August 2014 to December 2016. An example edit can be seen here. The paper discusses the design of the experiment, and the result, in detail, and also contains a supporting statistical analysis showing a number of significant results. The researchers expect the paper to be published in finalized form next year, and are still doing work on assessing the quality of the expert comments.
The authors conclude that experts are more likely to contribute if they receive a personalized email clearly mentioning their recent studies and areas of expertise. Another helpful aspect is if this invitation comes from an expert in the same field (rather than a random other person, including a random Wikipedia volunteer or WMF staff member). It is also helpful to appeal not only to the self-less argument that "We should contribute to Wikipedia because it is a public good, etc.", but also to more selfish motives, such as that one can add citations to one's own work to Wikipedia which can improve the likelihood of their publications being cited. Experts would also like for contributions to be more easily identifiable and attributable, and it is suggested that Wikipedia should make it easier for experts to receive recognition, for example through listing their contributions and names on a related WikiProject page.
Overall, this is a very interesting study, and it is commendable the authors did it in a way that is highly transparent to the community. The code for the bot is available on GitHub, though I was unable to find any indication that it is freely licensed, which sadly suggests that if the Wikipedia community would like to reuse it, it may not be able to do so (we will correct this statement as soon as any clarification/license link is found and available). Hopefully, the Wikipedia community and WMF will be able to capitalize on the findings from this study, developing it into a larger outreach program to academics.
Other recent publications
Other recent publications that could not be covered in time for this issue include the items listed below. contributions are always welcome for reviewing or summarizing newly published research.
"Crowdsourcing not all sourced by the crowd: An observation on the behavior of Wikipedia participants"[4] From the abstract: "From the analysis of 342 Wikipedia articles, this study shows that the overall tone of Wikipedia articles is mostly decided by a dominant few rather than by a trivial many, and such domination worsens as the number of participant increases and the article matures. This result contradicts a common belief on crowdsourcing that Wikipedia would reflect the voices of a vast majority, obtain a balanced solution, and attain democracy on the Internet. Therefore, this study contributes to the literature by analyzing how effectively Wikipedia functions as a crowdsourcing platform within the context. It also implies that developing a proper crowdsourcing strategy such as effective management of a platform is necessary, especially when an organization has a specific goal to achieve throughout a project."
"A Method for Predicting Wikipedia Editors' Editing Interest: Based on a Factor Graph Model"[5] From the abstract: "this paper proposes an Interest Prediction Factor Graph (IPFG) model, which is characterized by editor's social properties, hyperlinks between Wikipedia entries, the categories of an entry and other important features, to predict an editor's editing interest in types of Wikipedia entries."
"Social patterns and dynamics of creativity in Wikipedia"[6] From the abstract: "We collect contribution data from a random sample of Wikipedia articles and use a novel approach of analysing the correlations between editors' contribution patterns over the life-time of the articles. We find support for the existence of four socially conditioned personas among the editors and statistical difference in distribution of personas in articles of different qualities. Our findings add domain-specific details, features and attributes to the existing knowledge on editor roles and personas."
"Trusting Wikipedia. Vandalism attacks and content resilience: an analysis model and some empirical evidence" (in Italian, original title: "Fidarsi di Wikipedia. Attacchi vandalici e resilienza dei contenuti: un modello di analisi ed alcune evidenze empiriche")[7] From the abstract (translated): "As for the resilience capacity of Wikipedia, the results are obtained using an empirical approach. This consists of inserting errors within the page sample [on the Italian WIkipedia] under specific methodological constraints and then assessing how soon and in what manner these errors are corrected."
"Does Wikipedia matter? The effect of Wikipedia on tourist choices"[8] From the abstract: "Our results suggest a strong observational correlation between the amount of content on Wikipedia and tourist overnight stays. We propose a check of whether this correlation is causal. For that, we introduce randomized exogenous variation to articles' content. While our treatment is strong enough to affect content on the treated pages positively, we find no statistically significant effect of this treatment on tourist overnight stays."
"Travel Attractions Recommendation with Knowledge Graphs"[9] From the abstract: "we constructed a rich world scale travel knowledge graph from existing large knowledge graphs namely Geonames, DBpedia and Wikidata. The underlying ontology contains more than 1200 classes to describe attractions. We applied a city-dependent user profiling strategy that makes use of the fine semantics encoded in the constructed graph."
Identifying missing topics in a knowledge graph based on Wikipedia's notability criteria[10] From the abstract: "While large Knowledge Graphs (KGs) already cover a broad range of domains to an extent sufficient for general use, they typically lack emerging entities that are just starting to attract the public interest. This disqualifies such KGs for tasks like entity-based media monitoring, since a large portion of news inherently covers entities that have not been noted by the public before. [... We] propose a machine learning approach which tackles the most frequent but least investigated challenge, i.e., when entities are missing in the KG and cannot be considered by entity linking systems. We construct a publicly available benchmark data set based on English news articles and editing behavior on Wikipedia. Our experiments show that predicting whether an entity will be added to Wikipedia is challenging. However, we can reliably identify emerging entities that could be added to the KG according to Wikipedia’s own notability criteria."
"A Corpus of Wikipedia Discussions: Over the Years, with Topic, Power and Gender Label"[11] From the abstract: "we present a large corpus of Wikipedia Talk page discussions that are collected from a broad range of topics, containing discussions that happened over a period of 15 years. The dataset contains 166,322 discussion threads, across 1236 articles/topics that span 15 different topic categories or domains. The dataset also captures whether the post is made by a registered user or not, and whether he/she was an administrator at the time of making the post. It also captures the Wikipedia age of editors in terms of number of months spent as an editor, as well as their gender."
"Modeling user interest in social media using news media and Wikipedia"[12]From the abstract: "... we propose a user modeling framework that maps the content of texts in social media to relevant categories in news media. In our framework, the semantic gaps between social media and news media are reduced by using Wikipedia as an external knowledge base. We map term-based features from a short text and a news category into Wikipedia-based features such as Wikipedia categories and article entities. A user's microposts are thus represented in a rich feature space of words. Experimental results show that our proposed method using Wikipedia-based features outperforms other existing methods of identifying users' interests from social media."
Visualization tool for experiments with Wikipedia as a NLP resource: [13] From the abstract: "we describe Docforia, a multilayer document model and application programming interface (API) to store formatting, lexical, syntactic, and semantic annotations on Wikipedia and other kinds of text and visualize them. While Wikipedia has become a major NLP resource, its scale and heterogeneity makes it relatively difficult to do experimentations on the whole corpus. These experimentations are rendered even more complex as, to the best of our knowledge, there is no available tool to visualize easily the results of a processing pipeline..."
"Leveraging the Crowdsourcing of Lexical Resources for Bootstrapping a Linguistic Data Cloud"[14] From the abstract: "We present a declarative approach implemented in a comprehensive open-source framework based on DBpedia to extract lexical-semantic resources – an ontology about language use – from Wiktionary. The data currently includes language, part of speech, senses, definitions, synonyms, translations and taxonomies (hyponyms, hyperonyms, synonyms, antonyms) for each lexical word. Main focus is on flexibility to the loose schema and configurability towards differing language-editions of Wiktionary. [..] The extracted data is as fine granular as the source data in Wiktionary [...]. It enables use cases like disambiguation or machine translation. By offering a linked data service, we hope to extend DBpedia’s central role in the LOD infrastructure to the world of Open Linguistics."
"Jewish, Christian and Islamic in the English Wikipedia"[15] From the abstract: "I use corpus linguistics tools to extract the adjective noun collocates of the adjectives Jewish, Christian, and Islamic from the 2013 English Wikipedia in order find out their semantic prosody.[...] In the case of negative nouns, an ANOVA test found a statistically significant difference. Pair-wise comparisons suggest that Islamic is more negative than either Christian or Jewish ... "
^Launonen, Pentti; Tiilikainen, Sanna; Kern, K.c. (2016-01-01). "Social patterns and dynamics of creativity in Wikipedia". International Journal of Organisational Design and Engineering. 4 (1–2): 137–152. doi:10.1504/IJODE.2016.080170. ISSN1758-9797.
Tech news from the Wikimedia technical community: 2017 #9–#23. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available on Meta.
Some watchlist gadgets didn't work for a period of time in the first week of March. This has now been fixed. (Wikitech mailing list)
Admins who click on "mass delete" on a user's Special:Contributions will be taken directly to a list pages created by that user. It has worked like this before, but not lately. (Phabricator task T158502)
On 15 March some interwiki links to other languages were not correctly sorted. This has been fixed. If you still see pages where the interwiki links are not sorted as they should be, they should be fixed automatically with time or you can edit the page and save it without changing anything. If this doesn't work, please report it. (Phabricator task T160465)
Special:AllPages was disabled for two days due to some performance issues. It is back, but the filter for redirects is gone as the cause of the performance problem. It still needs to be fixed. (Phabricator tasks T160916, T160983)
Wikidata descriptions, aliases and labels that used some characters could not be saved. This has now been fixed. (Phabricator task T161263)
Some users have a problem with the watchlist. Some changes in categories make the watchlist a blank page. The developers are working on this. Until this is fixed you can try some things that have helped other editors if you have this problem. You can turn on Hide categorization of pages in your watchlist preferences. You can turn off Expand watchlist to show all changes, not just the most recent in your watchlist preferences. You can remove problematic categories from Special:EditWatchlist/raw. (Phabricator task T164059)
There was a problem with the visual editor for several days. You could not save edits that triggered a CAPTCHA. This would for example be when a new user added external links in references. This was fixed on 2 May. (Phabricator task T164157)
May 25th’s MediaWiki version was rolled back from some wikis because of a problem. This means planned changes did not happen. It was fixed late the following week. (Phabricator tasks T163512, T165957)
Recent changes
Editing:
You will be able to use <chem> to write chemical formulas in the visual editor. Previously this only worked in the wikitext editor. (Phabricator task T153365)
The way you switch between wikitext and the visual editors in the desktop view has changed. It is now a drop-down menu. This is the same as in the mobile view. (Phabricator task T116417)
When you edit with the visual editor, you will be able to switch the direction you write in from right-to-left to left-to-right as you are editing. This is especially important for editors who edit in languages that write from right to left. You can do this with a tool in the editing menu. You can also use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Shift+X on PCs or Cmd+Shift+X on Macs. (Phabricator task T153356)
When you edit with the visual editor, you can see a visual diff as well as a wikitext diff when you review your changes. (MediaWiki.org documentation)
The list of special characters in the wikitext editor and the visual editor will now have a group of Canadian Aboriginal characters. (Phabricator task T108626)
The tracking category Category:Pages with template loops is now added when a template loop is found. A template loop is for example when a template tries to use a second template that uses the first template. (Phabricator task T160743)
The Save page button now says Publish pageorPublish changes on most Wikipedias, and on other Wikimedia wikis except for Wikinewses. The point is to make it more clear that the edit will change the page immediately. Publish page is when you save a new page and Publish changes when you edit an existing page. Information on Meta-Wiki)
When you edit you can switch between the visual editor and the wikitext editor. This works if the wiki you edit has the visual editor. The menu will now say Visual editing and Source editing instead of Switch to visual editing and Switch to code editing. This is because it was confusing when the menu said you could switch to the editor you were already using. (Phabricator task T162864)
String comparisons in Scribunto modules are now always done case-insensitively by byte order. Before they were sometimes in a case-sensitive US-English collation order. This could break some modules. (Phabricator task T107128)
You can see monthly page views when you click on Page information in the sidebar. Developers can also get monthly page views through the API. (Phabricator task T125917)
RevisionSlider will change how you move between revisions. This will be a default feature on all wikis. RevisionSlider is an easier way to move between changes in the page history. It has been a default feature on German, Arabic and Hebrew Wikipedia and a beta feature on all wikis. You will be able to turn it off in your preferences. (Phabricator task T163685)
When you use the mobile view and click on a link to an article in another language you will see that article in the mobile view. Previously it changed to the desktop view. (Phabricator task T156578
You can now search on English, French, Hebrew and Greek wikis and find words even if you forget the diacritics. It also works if you use diacritics in your search but the wiki doesn't. (Phabricator task T155515)
Wikimedia wikis can show fewer links to articles in other languages. This is to make it easier to find the languages likely to be useful to the reader or editor. Everyone can still click to see the full list. Logged-in users who use the compact language links will see languages they have in their Babel box on their user page in the first, shorter list. You can turn the compact language list off or on in your preferences. (Phabricator task T135371)
You can choose what dates to look at when you look at a user's contributions. (Phabricator task T120733)
When you click on your watchlist in the mobile view you get a list of all pages in the watchlist instead of the latest changes to them. Logged-in users with at least ten edits will now get the latest changes instead. (Phabricator task T88270)
The name "Wikipedia" is more obvious at the top of the page when you read Wikipedia in the mobile view. This is because many readers don't realize they are on Wikipedia. (Phabricator task T148514, MediaWiki.org project)
Administrators:
English Wikipedia now has cookie blocks. It will come to more wikis in the future. This is an extension to the autoblock system so when a user is blocked, the next time they visit the wiki a cookie will be set. This means that even if the user switches accounts and to a new IP address the cookie will block them again. (Phabricator task T5233)
When administrators, bureaucrats and stewards make a user a member of a user group they can now set an expiry date. A user group is for example "administrators" or "bots". This means that they can give someone user rights for a limited time. This is similar to how blocks and page protections can be limited in time. Special:UserRights will have new options for this. You can read more about user groups.(Phabricator task T159416)
The "flag the edit in the abuse log" checkbox will be removed from the abuse filter interface. This is because the edits are always flagged in the abuse log. (Phabricator task T154091)
Some older web browsers are no longer able to use JavaScript on Wikimedia wikis. If you have an old web browser on your computer you can upgrade to a newer version. (Phabricator task T128115)
You can add ?safemode=1 to the end of the URL on Wikimedia wikis to disable your personal CSS and JavaScript. Example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literature?safemode=1. This means you can test if a problem is because of your user scripts or gadgets without uninstalling them. (Phabricator task T152169)
There will be a <div> tag around HTML from the MediaWiki wikitext parser. Gadgets with code that does not follow recommendations could have problems with this. You can report new problems you think are related to this. (Phabricator task T37247)
Other projects:
You will be able to show references from <references /> tags in more than one column on your wiki. This is the list of footnotes for the sources in the article. How many columns you see will depend on how big your screen is. On some wikis, some templates already do this. Templates that use <references /> tags will need to be updated, and then later the change can happen for all reference lists. This feature will be deployed turned off by default. It can be turned on at a local wiki by requesting a configuration change. (Phabricator task T33597, MediaWiki.org project)
The Wikiversity and Wikinews logos are now shown directly from the configuration and not from [[File:Wiki.png]]. If you want to change logo or have an anniversary logo, see how to request a configuration change. This is how it already works for other projects. They can request logo changes the same way. (Phabricator task T161980)
Wiktionary will handle interlanguage links in a new way. The Cognate extension will automatically link pages with the same title between Wiktionaries. For this to work all old interlanguage links have to be removed. You can read more about this. (MediaWiki.org announcement)
The MediaWiki-Vagrant portable development environment has been updated to use Debian Jessie. This means local development and testing will be more like on the majority of Wikimedia production servers. (Wikitech mailing list)
The Architecture Committee will change and get a new name. You can read and comment on the draft that describes the new committee.
You can upload 3D files to Commons. The file formats are AMF and STL. The plan is for this to work with the STL first; the AMF format will be available later. (Phabricator tasks T132058 & T158830)
Wikimedia wikis use OCG to create PDFs. The OCG code has a lot of problems and will stop working. It has to be replaced. An alternative is Electron. You can tell the developers what you need the PDF service to be able to do. Electron already works on German Wikipedia. It will be on English Wikipedia later this week so you can test it there too. (Phabricator task T165956)
Future changes
CSS in templates will be stored in a separate page in the future. (Q&A, discussion on MediaWiki.org)
Page Previews will be turned on for logged-out users on a large number of wikis in May. It could be postponed and happen later. Page Previews shows readers a short part of a linked article when they rest their mouse pointer on the link. This is to help them understand what it is about without leaving the article they are reading. Page Previews used to be called Hovercards. Users who have tested the feature can give feedback. Notes on Meta-Wiki)
All Wikimedia wikis will have cookie blocks from May 8. This is an extension to the autoblock system so when a user is blocked, the next time they visit the wiki a cookie will be set. This means that even if the user switches accounts and to a new IP address the cookie will block them again. (Phabricator task T5233)
The Publish changes, Show preview and Show changes buttons will look slightly different. This is to fit with the OOUI look. Users can test scripts, gadgets and so on to see if they work with the new interface by adding &ooui=1 to the URL. (Phabricator task T162849)
You will be able to get a notification when a page you created is connected to a Wikidata item. This will come to Wikivoyage on 9 May. If there are no problems it will come to most Wikipedias on 30 May. It will come to other projects and English, French and German Wikipedia later in the summer. It will be opt-in for existing users and opt-out for new users. (Phabricator task T142102)
Markup that looks like code for language variants might need to be fixed. If -{ is used in transclusionsorweb addresses it has to be escaped appropriately. You can use -<nowiki/>{ for transclusions and %2D{ in web addresses. A transclusion could for example be when you use -{ in a template: {{1x| sad :-{ face }}. This is because of some code fixes to the preprocessor and affects all wikis. (Wikimedia code review, MediaWiki.org documentation)
In brief
New tools
MTC! (short for "Move to Commons!") by User:Fastily is an easy-to-use tool that simplifies and streamlines the transferring of files to Commons. MTC! includes mass-transfer options and a built-in file filter which skips non-free and other Commons-ineligible files.
New user scripts to customise your Wikipedia experience
Word Count[1] (source)byUser:Caorongjin – Adds a link to the sidebar's toolbox to view various page size statistics. A variant on Prose Size that offers actual counting of words rather than counting whitespace characters, and handles separate counting of references.
Raw Source Link[3] (source)byUser:Kangaroopower – Adds a portlet that links to the raw source of a js/css page.
Footnote Cleanup[4] (source)byUser:Erutuon – Moves references, footnotes, and citation needed tags after punctuation.
Image Size[5] (source)byUser:Erutuon – Converts image sizes in pixels to upright (scaling) values, as pixel sizes are officially discouraged by WP:IMGSIZE except when absolutely necessary.
XFDcloser[6] (source)byUser:Evad37 – Close XfD discussions at AfD, CfD, FfD, MfD, RfD, and TfD, including actions to implement closes (e.g. deleting pages for "delete" results [admins only], removing nomination templates and adding 'old xfd' templates for "keep" results, etc)
The Wikipedia:Top 25 Report summarizes the most popular articles each week, drawing from Andrew West's Top 5000 list. We often republish the top 10. Here are two interesting weeks from recent months.
Indian film dominance, May holidays (April 30 to May 6, 2017)
There are 125 million English speakersinIndia. And when there's something big there, it can get really big. Top of the list for the week of April 30 - May 6, 2017, is the new film Baahubali 2: The Conclusion (#1), and this list also contains the previous film in the series. (#8). And the lead actor (#7). And the lead actress (#16). And the director (#23). With all this interest, no surprise to see that Baahubali 2: The Conclusion is also top of the list of highest-grossing Indian films of all times. A list which is also on this list. (#3).
Of course, American culture can also get on the list. There's a new Marvel Cinematic Universe film at #4 and the still popular The Fate of the Furious at #24. On the smaller screen (or maybe not? Some people have really big TVs) 13 Reasons Why (#5) remains huge; a new adaptation of The Handmaid's Tale has brought people to the book (#12); a series on Albert Einstein has brought people to the physicist (#22); and the new series of American Gods has brought people to articles on both the original book and the adapted series. (#17 & #19).
In sport, both fighters in last week's big fight at Wembley keep the interest (Joshua: #6; Klitschko: #11); another WWE event pulls in the viewers (#13); and basketball star Isaiah Thomas made a points-scoring return to the courts following the death of his sister (#25). There were the standard start of May commemorations - of Cinco de Mayo (#2) and of May Day (#9). Reddit has been learning about red pandas, the Vietnam War and John Clem (#14, #18, #20). Last, but by no means least, Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (#15) announced his impending retirement, which also brought interest to the Queen herself. (#21)
For the week of April 30 to May 6, 2017, the ten most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the WP:5000 report were:
The commemoration of the Mexican Army's victory over the French on 5 May 1862, at the Battle of Puebla makes its standard return to the chart. The date is now associated with celebrations of Mexican-American culture. Compared to last year, the article holds onto second place and is up about 200k views.
After one week on release, Baahubali 2: The Conclusion (#1), has become the highest-grossing Indian film of all time. At time of writing, our article gives a value of ₹1,227 crore for the film, which is about 190 million dollars or 175 million euro.
This is the fifteenth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and your writer has seen all of them, except for the minute the woman in front of me at Doctor Strange took to sit down. The James Gunn (pictured) directed superhero / sci-fi comedy is topping most charts worldwide, with its star cast including the likes of Vin Diesel and Kurt Russell. Worldwide, the film is currently on $430 million, which is about 390 million euroor₹2,768 crore.
Continued popularity for Netflix's hit drama series, starring Dylan Minnette (pictured) and Katherine Langford. A second season of the drama has been commissioned, which is not surprising from a business point of view but may be slightly from an artistic view; there being, as yet, no second book to base the second season on.
Joshua claimed the WBA and IBO heavyweight boxing championships, in addition to retaining his IBF title; following his 19th straight knockout victory since becoming a professional boxer on his 29 April fight with Wladimir Klitschko (#11) at Wembley Stadium - a fight held in front of a post-war record crowd of 90,000 and setting a British record for PPV buys.
The first film in the series which was followed this week by Baahubali 2: The Conclusion (#1). The film is currently the fourth highest-grossing Indian film of all time, but its takings have already been almost doubled by the continuation.
Wikipedia readers this week focused on one thing above all others: the land of undersized seats and over pricedpopcorn! A combination of the 89th Academy Awards and interest in current box office hits results in 19 out of 25 coming from the world of film; led by the sad death of actor Bill Paxton. All four acting award winners are represented here, as are 5 of the 9 Best Picture nominees.
Away from the world of film, rapper Remy Ma attracted interest for her new diss track and Ash Wednesday began the Christian fasting period of Lent. Before the fast begun, however, Reddit discovered an interesting fact about Rice. Also, Donald Trump (#16) continues.--OZOO
Winner of three Academy Awards, including Best Picture. The first all-black Best Picture and the first LGBT Best Picture; the win was unfortunately overshadowed by an envelope mixup, resulting in La La Land holding the award for about five minutes. Director Barry Jenkins pictured.
The main page for the week's big award show (pictured: host Jimmy Kimmel) was unsurprisingly popular, with readers likely trying to catch up on the list of winners or the envelope mixup.
The 10th movie associated with the X-Men and the final appearence for Hugh Jackman (pictured) as Wolverine; Logan opened this week to near-unanimously positive reviews and almost $250m worldwide gross.
Jordan Peele's directorial debut, the satirical horror movie has received, if anything, even more unanimous positivity from reviewers than Logan; and sits second in the US box office.
The other half of the envelope mixup (see #2); the incident did rather overshadow the rest of the night, which saw the musical pick up six Awards, including Best Director for Damien Chazelle. (pictured)
Another Academy Award winner, this time for Best Actress. It is interesting to note that Wikipedia readers seem more interested in the actors than the actresses, isn't it?.
The rest of the Best Picture nominees: Arrival (film) (38th); Hidden Figures (42nd); Fences (film) (48th); Hell or High Water (outside top 200). Hell or High Water is the only one not currently showing in cinemas, which may explain that.
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(English pronunciation: /ˈdʒɑn ˈmaɪkəl ˈsiːɡənθɔːlər/ ⓘ; German pronunciation: [ˈjuːˈan ˈmaɪkəl ˈziːkənθɔːlər] ⓘ; born December 21, 1955 in Nashville, Tennessee
, Činggis Qaɣan; Chinese: 成吉思汗; pinyin: Chéng Jí Sī Hán; probably May 31, 1162[3] – August 25, 1227), born Temujin (English pronunciation: /təˈmuːdʒɪn/; Mongolian: Тэмүжин, Temüjin IPA: [tʰemutʃiŋ] ⓘ; Middle Mongolian: Temüjin;[4] traditional Chinese: 鐵木真; simplified Chinese: 铁木真; pinyin: Tiě mù zhēn) and also known by the temple name Taizu (Chinese: 元太祖; pinyin: Yuán Tàizǔ; Wade–Giles: T'ai-Tsu), was the founder and Great Khan (emperor) of the Mongol Empire, which became the largest contiguous empire in history after his death.
Tidy is going to be replaced with an HTML5 parsing algorithm. Bad HTML in wikitext would cause problems on a number of wikis. There is now a ParserMigration extension on all wikis that you can use to help clean this up. You can read more about how you can use it. (Phabricator task T141586)
