Forum:CT Archive/Intermediate article milestone

At the moment, there are two types of Good Articles: the ones that are comprehensive and have all the information on a given topic, just not enough to reach 1000 words and therefore Featured Article status, and the ones that could reach Featured Article status, with a little more elbow grease and research.

Now, last time a change to the GA rules was proposed, it was shot down, since people like the fact that you can have an article milestone without making the work perfect. In hindsight, that's fair enough, and I intend to leave that alone. But to my mind, it's a little misleading when these incomplete articles are given the same label as some fully complete articles.

So how do we remedy this? Simple. We make these complete articles Featured Articles as well, but since there's not enough content to warrant being "Featured" on the main page, they're simply not. These article would have some sort of "Featured" status, just not at the same level as the ones that are over 1000 words, and therefore can reach the main page.

And this wouldn't even require a separate page or system. All that is needed is an amendment to the current FA rules:

Instead of "…counting the introduction and "Behind the scenes" material, be at least 1000 words long (not including captions, quotes, or headers, etc)."

We have "…counting the introduction and "Behind the scenes" material, be at least 1000 words long (not including captions, quotes, or headers, etc) in order for it to be featured on the main page. If it is less than 1000 words and more than 250 words, it will be granted Minor Featured Article status, and will not be shown on the main page."

Or something like that. The "250" and the "Minor" aren't really concrete, but I hope you understand what I'm getting at. Basically, we're presenting the reader with stuff that is premium content, but just plain isn't enough to be put on the main page. Before we vote on this, I'd like to mull it around with a bit of discussion, perhaps refine the idea and the presentation. Play ball. Thefourdotelipsis 05:52, 13 April 2008 (UTC)