Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Unreferenced articles

Headline: We cleared 5,733 articles and are now hovering just over 63,000 (63,303 to be exact)! My predictions for clearing 50,000 by the end of the year seem increasingly likely. For yourself and your fellow editors, please clap.
Minutiae: For anyone interested in a more detailed breakdown of the numbers - average was 69.1 articles; median 23; mode 20. This is a significant jump from last month (average 35.3; median 12; mode 11), so really well done! Of the categories being tracked, all but ONE had a decline of at least 10 articles and over 3% of their starting number compared to previous update (I consider this a growth metric that we're being comprehensive in clearing categories across the board), so this is fantastic. The smallest decrease was December 2019, which only decreased by 9 articles.

Highlights: May and June 2009 are in dustbin of history! The leaderboard also seems to be bringing out the competitive spirit in people, which is perfect as we get ready for our June 2025 drive.

Low-hanging fruit: The infamous September 2019 is a runty 81 articles, dangling precariously like a sinner in the hands of an angry God. If you're not a fan of square numbers, June 2024 is a bite-sized 94. Food for thought.

High-hanging fruit: Everyone's favourite BFC (Big Friendly Category), December 2009, is a mouth-watering 8,278 articles as of this writing, after a decrease of 830. The other high-hanging fruit are, still, the Frustrating Five (name open for revision): January 2013 (924), May 2019 (1,639), June 2019 (3,604), September 2020 (961), and March 2024 (854). Eagle-eyed readers may have caught that previous squad member April 2019 has been ousted from the hall of infamy, so well done there. Once again, September 2020 had the lowest percentage of change between updates (1.43%). Godspeed to anyone working on these.
New challenge: We're back with the ties! December 2015 and January 2016 are in a dead heat of 248. If you strongly prefer one year over another, pick a side and hold the line.
Announcements: June 2025 is right around the corner! We seem to have found the rhythm of how the drives work, which is great, and additional organizational help would be much appreciated by new members. As always, I think the goals are a) clearing 10,000 articles and b) clearing the entire backlog (whatever we have) of unreferenced BLPs, but happy to have secret, member-specific goals. All the best, Kazamzam (talk) 00:08, 5 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Everyone making great progress, well done all! It looks like User:Someonefighter may have been banned unfortunately so we may all have to work that bit harder to reference those articles this month! Coldupnorth (talk) 08:49, 8 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I am here again! I will continue to contribute Someonefighter (talk) 13:37, 9 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Glad to see you're back :) ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 17:16, 9 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I am glad to return! and hopefully win first spot this time haha Someonefighter (talk) 21:27, 9 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome back! Happy referencing! Coldupnorth (talk) 11:51, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Why are almost all Indian villages spelled incorrectly?

Someonefighter and I are struggling through this area of unreferenced articles right now and it is a pain. The issue is that nearly every Indian village article on Wikipedia is named incorrectly. Often by just a letter or two or phonetically (rather than -u, it's -oo), but I still just don't understand why so many of them are wrong. Do these places not have actual proper spellings? The census I'm working from definitely has a spelling they could have used.

This feels like when I try and work on a biographical article from 1800s America and there's no consistent spelling of the person's last name, likely because the person was illiterate and just told the census takers and journalists over the years their name and each of those people just assumed the spelling in different ways based on what they heard.

Is that what's going on here? Indian villages just didn't have consistent spelling until recently? Or is it just that the many different editors that made these articles are terrible at spelling (or at least terrible at looking up how to spell these villages properly)? Silver seren^C 01:39, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Silver seren: Hunterian transliteration is my best guess. From that article: 'Opponents of the grapheme transliteration model continued to mount unsuccessful attempts at reversing government policy until the turn of the century, with one critic calling appealing to "the Indian Government to give up the whole attempt at scientific (i.e. Hunterian) transliteration, and decide once and for all in favour of a return to the old phonetic spelling."'. I don't envy that part of the unreferenced queue. --Engineerchange (talk) 03:08, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the two of us are definitely making progress. Though I'm skipping any of the villages that I can't find anything in the census for even under reasonable alternative spellings. So we're not getting rid of all of them. It really feels like that the longer the village name (and some of these are super long), the more incorrect the spelling is. Silver seren^C 03:13, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I use AI to determine if they are there Someonefighter (talk) 04:37, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

To help search for them? By looking at spelling probability? Silver seren^C 04:42, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

yes, I use algorithms like fuzzy matching and soundex sentence transformers as well as RTX chatbot (it was made for these things, unlike chatGPT)

Usually RTX chatbot finds it without the half-baked script I wrote for the algorithms Someonefighter (talk) 05:16, 11 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Silver seren I think it is likely that Indian villages are often not spelled consistently in English. It is also true that people who wrote completely unreferenced articles are likely to have been terrible at looking stuff up by current Wikipedia standards. I found an interesting book on Google books Mapping Place Names of India (Anu Kapur, 2019) which says The purpose [of transliteration] was clearly to serve the English speaker and reader. Independent India has not been able to put forward an 'Indianized' system of transliteration for 70 years! and goes on to discuss the issues of Standardization the Anglicized way.

It is useful to try and find sources and standardise spellings, but not surprising that the original editors did not do so.

As an example, Someonefighter has recently moved Osiyan, Unnao to Aosiyan. I can find Google book hits for Osiyan, Unnao, but not Aosiyan, Unnao. The article mentions J.D.V.M. Inter College, where a Google search for the college finds Instagram and Facebook accounts saying osiyan and Yayschool saying Aosiyan. Villages may have different local spellings in Hindi and other local languages: according to file:Languages of Uttar Pradesh State.png Unnao is in the area where it is difficult to say whether it is Awadhi or Kannauji. TSventon (talk) 09:02, 12 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Update: it took me a while but I eliminated almost all villages/towns in India, as well as almost all in Pakistan and some of Sri Lanka (all villages of Sri Lanka). Back in April (when I first looked it at) south Asia category was about 2.5k articles. Now it is 615. I am currently looking for a list of towns in Sri Lanka that isn't behind a paywall (I have found the villages one used it, but it does not contain towns)

Despite challenges, this is some impressive work we did Someonefighter (talk) 18:55, 13 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I assume you're running a script for edits, Someonefighter? Since it looks like you did several hundred in just a few minutes and did the template removals in a batch afterwards. Be careful with that, since you don't want to run afoul of WP:MEATBOT related policies. Silver seren^C 23:09, 13 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your concerns, @Silver seren. I prepare all pages in a lengthy process (in the case of citation), then submit them all at the same time (alt+tab -> alt+shift+s many times). For this reason my edits are mostly fractured, since it is more convenient to split them into multiple actions. I do not use scripts to directly edit or submit the articles, only to determine if they're in the lists as I've said earlier. Someonefighter (talk) 08:54, 14 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

June 2025 Backlog Drive

OK informal backlog drive planning committee, I know everyone is busy but we have a backlog drive to run in June. What do we need to do to get the page out of "Planning" mode, @ARandomName123? A little concerned that only one other person has signed up for the backlog drive so far. (Could we maybe mimic what the NPP Backlog Drive folks do...banner at the top of the backlog drive page asking for signups?) I also kind of like their registration box but whatever, we just need people to sign up at this point. @DreamRimmer At what point is it optimal to run a Watchlist page notice thing? Pinging @Kazamzam @SunloungerFrog. Any other volunteers who more or less know the drill...? (I actually don't want to stop the goodness that is the marathon so please don't stop running, as we still need to add references in May as well.) Cielquiparle (talk) 02:20, 12 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

What is the backlog? Someonefighter (talk) 06:32, 12 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

All the unreferenced articles in Category:All articles lacking sources. We run a backlog drive about twice a year. The last one was in November 2024. Cheers, SunloungerFrog (talk) 07:20, 12 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you,

I still dont understand what's going to happen in june Someonefighter (talk) 07:44, 12 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

We just have a particular focus/push to reference as many articles as we can. You probably don't need to change anything you're doing, @Someonefighter, given your position on the leaderboard :) apart from include #JUN25 in your edit summaries so that they get counted. Cheers, SunloungerFrog (talk) 07:51, 12 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't worry too much about the current amount of sign ups yet. I don't believe we've done any advertising whatsoever, and I'm pretty sure most comes from the watchlist notice anyways.

As for getting out of planning mode, I there isn't much left to do on the drive page itself. Maybe spread the word to the usual places, put out a talk page notice, WP:CBB, etc. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 14:23, 12 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Though if you do have any thoughts about the drive page, feel free to share. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 14:23, 12 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I also, wouldn't worry, had no idea signing up was possible at this point. Mrfoogles (talk) 05:59, 20 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Cielquiparle - so sorry for my prolonged absence, this month has been crazy busy. I think the drive planning to increase sign-ups so far (banner, watchlist header, talk page + project page, talk page reminders for individual signups) has been great. I agree with @ARandomName123 that not much more is necessary but it would be cool to get the word out to other WikiProjects that people are active in - I can do WP Japan for example. I think we could be more detailed in the talk page template about why this is important (age of the backlog, for example).

Also, and this is just me, but I think we should have a goal once again of 10,000 articles. Consistency with previous drives is a plus, but I'm open to other arguments. Alternatively, we could switch it to 5,000 articles because we are almost certain to blow through that and it would be a boost to editors to set and meet goals. Cheers, Kazamzam (talk) 14:00, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Kazamzam I went back and checked, and we had a lower target for November 2024 in part based on the number of signups. Personally I like that you set us the 50k goal for end of year, which we seem well on track to achieve, plus it's easy to remember – an epic milestone for URA if we do achieve it by mid-year. Cielquiparle (talk) 16:55, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Cielquiparle - complaining about shifting goalposts when I'm the one shifting them...I will go to atone for my sins under a roaring waterfall like a Shugendo yamabushi (nice catch, thanks!) Kazamzam (talk) 17:27, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Kazamzam@Cielquiparle Have we reached out to project who have a lot of articles in our list? Off the top of my head I have Hinduism (many temples) and songs/music as well as sports. There are certainly many more that we could potentially attract editors from Someonefighter (talk) 18:33, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Kazamzam@Cielquiparle With the help of them, I do not see an issue with a 50k goal or even 45k if we are being bold (see my and silverseren's performance for this month) Someonefighter (talk) 18:35, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Someonefighter Great idea! Please go ahead and reach out. I think we should each reach out where we feel we can advocate why URA and the backlog drive should be of particular interest to whichever WikiProject. Cielquiparle (talk) 21:33, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Cielquiparle I have made this notice (basing it on your one). I will add it tomorrow to relevant pages. feel free to modify it and use it until then.

Please consider signing up for the June 2025 Unreferenced Articles backlog drive.
This project has over (insert number of articles here) recorded unreferenced article. Help us improve your project by adding citations and participating in the June push.

Someonefighter (talk) 22:39, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Public service announcement:

Please consider signing up for the June 2025 Unreferenced Articles backlog drive.
You can sign up for the drive here.

Thanks to everyone who signed up already. Cielquiparle (talk) 12:14, 13 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

FYI – I just placed a watchlist message request on MediaWiki Talk. (Went for short and sweet.) Is there something more we should be doing? @ARandomName123 @Kazamzam @SunloungerFrog @DreamRimmer Cielquiparle (talk) 04:19, 20 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Cielquiparle, I'm dusting off my Petscan and Massviews searches for the popular unreferenced articles section. I don't really know about any other way of drumming up support, other than sending a talk page message to those who have subscribed in the past. Is it inappropriate to post on other groups' talk pages if we are part of those groups? For instance, I would happily post a short message on new pages patrol talk provided I won't get tutted at. Cheers, SunloungerFrog (talk) 05:30, 20 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@SunloungerFrog That's a great idea. Quite certain others have done so in the past. Might even be helpful to explain to them how to use Petscan to find the Unreferenced articles relevant to their respective topics. Anyone else up for reaching out to other WikiProjects? Cielquiparle (talk) 11:07, 20 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Adding CC: @Turtlecrown for ideas on recruiting for the backlog drive. Cielquiparle (talk) 15:15, 20 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

We also need to send out a mass message to the people at Wikipedia:WikiProject Unreferenced articles/Mailing list. Thanks for dealing with the watchlist notice. I don't believe there's much else that's necessary. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 15:45, 20 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've updated the message from last time, over at Wikipedia:WikiProject Unreferenced articles/Newsletter. Please feel free to make any adjustments you see fit, and ping DreamRimmer once it's ready (I'll do so tmrw). You can see it below

Extended content

== Unreferenced articles June 2025 backlog drive ==

WikiProject Unreferenced articles | June 2025 Backlog Drive

There is a substantial backlog of unsourced articles on Wikipedia, and we need your help! The purpose of this drive is to add sources to these unsourced articles and make a meaningful impact.

Barnstars will be awarded based on the number of articles cited.
Remember to tag your edit summary with #JUN25, both to advertise the event and tally the points later using Hashtag Summary Search.
Interested in taking part? Sign up here.

You're receiving this message because you have subscribed to the mailing list. To opt-out of future mailings, please remove yourself here.

ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 16:29, 20 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@ARandomName123: Looks great! We are up to 33 participants now. And even if a few of the people who receive the mass message have already signed up, they have Talk page followers who will see the message and sign up that way, probably. Cielquiparle (talk) 03:41, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Now up to 41, I'm hoping we can hit triple digits before the drive begins. @DreamRimmer:, the mass message (Wikipedia:WikiProject Unreferenced articles/Newsletter) is ready to be sent. The mailing list is at Wikipedia:WikiProject Unreferenced articles/Mailing list. Thanks for your help with this! ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 16:04, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Sent – DreamRimmer ■ 16:16, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@ARandomName123 Looks like we are just 3 short with ~4 more days to go. (If you are reading this and haven't signed up for the June URA backlog drive yet, please do so now.) The sign-up page is here. Cielquiparle (talk) 10:41, 28 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Just...need...one...more. Cielquiparle (talk) 04:26, 29 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Do we need to have #JUN25 tagging?

I was just wondering, since I saw some mention above about using this tag for the edits to "count". Is that really necessary since we have the leaderboard now? (And we'll have a June specific page for it when that month starts.) So, any removal of the template during that month will show up on that leaderboard, with diffs even for the removal. Why would tagging your edit with #JUN25 be necessary? You can still include an edit summary mentioning this project, if promotion is the purpose. Silver seren^C 23:45, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Silver seren: The tagging for #JUN25 is intended to also cover articles that have this issue (no citations), but are not tagged yet (with the template). ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 01:35, 22 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Silver seren @ARandomName123 It also prevents editors from claiming points if all they did was remove the tag (e.g. when another editor added a citation but forgot to remove the tag). All #JUN25 tagged edits are subject to review by other editors (who get 0.5 points for reviewing) and points can be deducted if it turns out that the citation added was inappropriate, or if a citation wasn't added in the first place (even if it's for a very good reason). (We do however allow dummy edits after the fact to add #JUN25 if someone forgot to add it in the same step as adding the citation.) The two leaderboards will start to diverge for these reasons in terms of points, but my hypothesis is that they will end up being quite similar in terms of ranking. Cielquiparle (talk) 03:27, 22 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

On second thought, the two leaderboards may differ quite a bit because editors can accumulate a large number of points for reviewing, which actually is a key part of the backlog drive. Cielquiparle (talk) 04:12, 22 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Issue with category?

I can't browse based on topics or tags in the list of articles that lack sources. When searching topics, it gives me no results Someonefighter (talk) 15:19, 15 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Think it was just a glitch. Your first two links work for me and return results (1741 and 595 respectively). Cheers, SunloungerFrog (talk) 15:23, 15 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This hasn't been working for hours but now does. Thanks for letting me know Someonefighter (talk) 15:33, 15 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Additionally, sometimes clicking on "Purge server cache" & Reload web browser page will work. Cheers, JoeNMLC (talk) 18:02, 15 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Fix a random page lacking sources

Hi everyone, can we maybe add a similar button to the lead of this page as the one in the June 2025 drive? GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 06:06, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@GOAT Bones231012 do you mean the lead of the talk page or of the project page itself? Kazamzam (talk) 13:55, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Kazamzam The main page. I kind of like the idea of clicking a single button that instantly takes me to a random completely unreferenced page where I can learn about something new and improve the article as well, as opposed to going to a list and choosing a certain topic/page that you are already familiar with. GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 14:44, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@DreamRimmer - what do you think of this? I don't think it should be at the top of the main page but maybe somewhere in the header would be doable and convenient. @GOAT Bones231012, fair warning you will find this to be a LOT of train stations and villages in the Indian subcontinent. Kazamzam (talk) 14:48, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I figured lol. Unseo station was one of the first ones that popped up for me yesterday. The user can always refresh the button and be taken to a different random page, but if that’s what most of the unreferenced pages are, maybe it’s not such a bad thing to take some of the backlog off these topics? GOAT Bones231012 (talk) 15:06, 21 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@GOAT Bones231012: No comment on adding this to the main page. If you are interested, you can add the following code to your common.js. It will add a link to your tools menu, and clicking it will take you to a random unsourced page each time.

mw.loader.using(['mediawiki.util'], function () {
    mw.util.addPortletLink(
        'p-cactions',
        '/wiki/Special:RandomInCategory/All_articles_lacking_sources',
        'Fix a random page lacking sources',
        't-random-unsourced',
        'Go to a random unsourced article'
    );
});

– DreamRimmer ■ 03:55, 22 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Template expiry

Shouldn't {{WikiProject Unreferenced articles}} have a date parameter, and cease to be displayed (or be removed by a bot) after a number of years?

Unlike other, thematic, wiki projects, articles will cease to be of interest to this project once well-referenced. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:18, 29 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Well, you can debate whether it should be there, but the purpose (which I generally agree with) is to kind of give credit to the WP:URA project for putting in the article's first reference. The goal is not to mark articles of interest to the project, but to take credit for improving articles so that people know about the project that is citing the articles they're reading. This helps the project survive (by ideally providing some influx of new members/people who are at least aware of it) and also makes people who provide an article's first reference feel good because they get the reward of leaving a nice template after they improve an article. The idea is that, even if the article does get majorly expanded afterwards, the addition of the first reference is still significant enough to leave a template. For most articles referenced by this project, they don't get more references independently afterward, so a significant portion of their quality is due to this project.

So no, if it ceased to be displayed it would go against the purpose of the banner, which is to make the work the project does visible. It's a different kind of thing. Mrfoogles (talk) 22:49, 31 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Remember to add #JUN25 to edit summaries

To all you hard-working 2025 Unreferenced article marathon runners out there: PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE just for the month of June, remember to add #JUN25 exactly once to eacn article you add citations to, which was previously unreferenced. This is what is required to appear on the special June 2025 backlog drive leaderboard which appears on the main WP:JUN25 backlog drive page. This means you, @NorthernWinds. Cielquiparle (talk) 07:56, 1 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Do mergers count for the drive?

Princess Dowager Zhang doesn't merit her own article, and I've merged the little known info about into her son Feng Ba's page. Clarityfiend (talk) 01:05, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Clarityfiend: I wouldn't count it, since a source isn't being added, as far as I can tell. Though if a source was added after the merger, then I guess it counts? Pinging @Cielquiparle, Kazamzam for their thoughts. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 02:09, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Clarityfiend Thanks for merging the content, but no it doesn't count. At first, I was going to suggest that if you really want a point for the purposes of the backlog drive, you could add a source to the unreferenced article (with the edit summary), THEN merge the content to the target page...but the rules on the main backlog drive page clearly say that "blank and redirect" doesn't count. Neither do PRODs or AfDs. Cielquiparle (talk) 04:00, 2 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Top 10 URA leaderboard for May 2025

The problem with backlog drives is that although the surge in participation is exhilirating while it lasts...activity tends to fall off immediately afterwards. In the case of WikiProject Unreferenced articles, however, we decided we wanted to create a "Marathon" edition of the competition that was running year-round. Thanks to @ARandomName123, there is a yearly leaderboard you can track here.

Why does it look different from the leaderboard you have been looking at daily at WP:JUN25? It's because it simply counts edits in which "Unreferenced" tags are removed. (@Clarityfiend: This may be of interest to you.) Also, users only appear on the yearly leaderboard once they have reached 5 points in a single month.

Collectively, May 2025 turned out to be our strongest month yet, thanks to the dedication, competitiveness, and research and citation skills of many editors. Turning now to the Top 10 leaderboard:


Rank	User	Total articles in May 2025
1	Silver seren	1864
2	NorthernWinds	1796
3	Cakelot1	454
4	JoeNMLC	188
5	Coldupnorth	131
6	Cielquiparle	115
7	LastJabberwocky	93
8	ARandomName123	68
9	Kazamzam	62
10	Turtlecrown	55

I have to confess that I was startled by the final outcome, as I could have sworn NorthernWinds (formerly know as Someonefighter) had managed to top Silver seren at the end of May...but sure enough, the mighty Silver seren really doesn't like to lose. The same top two editors from April 2025 took activity to a completely new level in May, both reaching an unprecedented four digits in a single month. At the same time, it was uplifting to realize that they were collaborating as well, as they powered through adding citations to a large number of unreferenced articles about Indian villages. (See section above.) Huge applause for this prolific pair.

Cakelot1 emerged as a force to be reckoned with, in third place with 454 points. There was a considerable delta between third and fourth place, with JoeNMLC, Coldupnorth, and yours truly in the 100–200 range. As for the rest of the board, it was good to see LastJabberwocky return with another strong showing. WikiProject URA and June backlog drive organizers ARandomName123 and Kazamzam emerged from their exams to place in 8th and 9th place, respectively, while Turtlecrown managed to take 10th place for the second month in a row.

Many thanks to all editors who added citations to articles during the first five months of 2025. You helped to reduce the backlog by 12,000+ articles since the beginning of the year, even before the June 2025 backlog drive got underway. Yes, next month's edition will look quite different...but with more editors on board to help, perhaps it's a good change of pace as we take some time to review each other's citations and check out the "Popular articles" refreshed several times daily by SunloungerFrog...and continue to explore ways of filtering and finding unreferenced articles of interest using tools like Petscan, Massviews, and Bambots.

Happy referencing! Cielquiparle (talk) 19:21, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I'm doing 3 articles a day. Bearian (talk) 19:31, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! I was indeed 50 points from #1 of the year at peak. Though recently university has been rough so I am slowing down a little bit (to say the least). Inshallah I'll be back after I'm done with all the tests and projects to trim a few more thousands from the backlog! NorthernWinds (talk) 20:17, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I can definitely say neither of us will be accomplishing that again. It only worked out because of the massive amount of village articles that could use the same source. Now we've only got the slog left of all the unconnected articles. I am really looking forward to Kazamzam's monthly overview, since I think a good amount of those village articles were in the Frustrating Five categories, so we should hopefully see some major movement on things from the past month. Silver seren^C 21:42, 6 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Silver seren - the Frustrating Five will be waiting for you! If you'd like a blast from the past, here is what the update was from almost exactly 2 years ago when the Frustrating Three (can you believe it) were just making waves, plus June 10th of 2022 was when I first proposed a competition to an audience of crickets. It only took the better part of two years to make it happen and now you and @NorthernWinds clear more articles together than we used to do in two months! I've definitely become less active because of personal obligations, which sucks, but also because it feels like this project has enough momentum to keep moving without me that I can take a bit of a break and let other people be kickass referencers. I'm so proud of everyone on this page and really excited to see how this drive shakes out. Truly thank you all so much! Cheers, Kazamzam (talk) 02:28, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It looks like the drive is going to quite handily get below 50k at this rate. We only needed a daily rate of about 280 articles and we've been easily surpassing that thus far. Silver seren^C 02:34, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Don't jinx it. All it takes is for someone to dump a truckload of new Unreferenced article tags, rightly or wrongly, into June 2025 for the number to start climbing back up again despite our best efforts. (It happened during the November 2024 drive.) Cielquiparle (talk) 04:46, 7 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

On a related note, @SunloungerFrog and I were talking a bit at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Unreferenced_articles/Backlog_drives/June_2025#Unreferenced_BLPs about the possibility of tagging the rest of the unreferenced BLPs, as that backlog is currently hovering very low. Of course, it would ideally be limited to a certain rate to prevent a dump of tags. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 21:05, 9 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@SunloungerFrog @ARandomName123 BTW, I commented on the other thread, but numbers-wise I think we can handle an "extra/new" 10 Unreferenced BLPs a day during this drive. Cielquiparle (talk) 08:15, 15 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Backlog drive schedule

Hi all—letting you know that I have created WP:DRIVES, to help drive schedulers avoid overlapping drives. When you schedule the next drive, feel free to make use of it, and it would be greatly appreciated if you could add your future drives :) House Blaster (talk • he/they) 23:45, 8 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Nice @HouseBlaster. It was sorely needed. Grabbed WP:NOV25 for URA. At URA, we dream of not needing to have any more backlog drives...but I imagine we may need to have at least one in 2026? Cielquiparle (talk) 20:30, 12 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Intersection of Unreferenced & old AfDs?

One of my frustrations is the amount of energy we collectively spend on AfD discussions where tons of references are identified and then never added to the articles which end up being kept.

For the purposes of URA, is there any way to easily identify Unreferenced articles that have been nominated for AfD in the past?

(OK, during this backlog drive I have found myself doing gymnastics to hunt for sources that were sitting right there in an old AfD discussion all along... I guess it goes to show that looking at the article history and Talk page can save a lot of time, but I was wondering if there is a way to identify them as a group.) Pinging: @SunloungerFrog @ARandomName123 Cielquiparle (talk) 05:09, 15 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Cielquiparle, try this petscan. It is basically All examples lacking sources in Categories (first tab), then Old AfD multi and Old XfD multi in Has any of these templates: (third tab) with the talk page ticked. If the AfD was closed correctly, then the talk page should always have one of those templates on it. Quick sample of the results seems to indicate that it does the trick. That is going to be my "popular articles of the day" search now! Cheers, SunloungerFrog (talk) 06:21, 15 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That's awesome @SunloungerFrog. Some of the old AfD discussions have made me laugh. They don't all have links to reliable sources and some of the articles are a bit cringe but I seriously think a lot of improvement will come from this. (It's always amazing with these unreferenced articles when you find the gem beneath the cruft.) Cielquiparle (talk) 08:01, 15 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Really interesting query, thanks for sharing! And wow, I know standards have changed, but mostly what I'm seeing so far are some of the worst AFD keeps I've ever seen; just walls of no-text votes or arguments straight out of WP:ATA. The past is a foreign country, etc. Suriname0 (talk) 14:11, 17 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I do my best after an AfD I've been involved in closes to remember to put the sources found on the talk page, so they're at least readily available for future usage. Silver seren^C 21:29, 17 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Can you get points for an article if you cite it and then merge it?

I cited Sint-Joris-Winge and tagged the edit, then decided to merge it into Tielt-Winge. Do I still get the points for citing the article? The citation is now present in the merged text on the Tielt-Winge page. Mrfoogles (talk) 00:50, 19 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Mrfoogles: Seeing as the article no longer exists, I think adding a reference in this case is pretty much equivalent to adding a reference to an already cited article, so I don't believe you would get points (though the hashtag tool probably counted it). This was mentioned a bit up at #Do mergers count for the drive?. I initially thought it would, but Cielquiparle's reasoning makes sense to me. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 16:11, 19 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thinking this through another way: If you hadn't added a citation to the article, there would have technically been "nothing to merge". So I'm potentially changing my mind! "Blank and redirect" doesn't count (as the rules currently say), but "add a citation, merge, and redirect" should be OK! Similarly, it's OK to add a citation and then nominate it yourself for deletion or PROD. You did technically add a citation and it matters because it informs the debate and decision making afterwards. Cielquiparle (talk) 16:18, 19 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Search engine I found

Wanted to drop Marginalia here because based on a few tests (found some sources I didn't know existed on obscure topics) it's really good at finding stuff on those obscure things that only get SEO spam results. I am interested to see what it can do on obscure villages but haven't tested them yet. Not very widely known but seems perfect for this project. Mrfoogles (talk) 18:26, 19 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Template:WikiProject Unreferenced articles

I noticed that an editor just removed this template from the talk page of an article I'd referenced in the NOV24 drive on the basis that "the article has sources". I know that this populates Category:Articles improved by WikiProject Unreferenced articles, although this only apparently has some 2,800 or so articles in it, and obviously we have done far more than that in this drive alone. I wondered whether we should consider retiring the template and maybe the corresponding category, as it seems clear that they are not used much, and sometimes misunderstood. Cheers, SunloungerFrog (talk) 15:45, 20 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Bot for projects to find more uncited articles?

@ARandomName123 or anyone,

Hello. It seems you have been considering bots. As a member of Wikipedia:WikiProject Climate change I would like to automatically tag any uncited articles related to our project which are not already tagged. Might you have time to make such a bot? For example as well as looking at the projects on the talk page it might also allow a project to specify a number of strings - say “climate change”, “fossil fuel”, “global warming” in our case.

Alternatively could you just run a bot to tag everything and leave us to figure out what is interesting to us?

Thanks and keep up the good work Chidgk1 (talk) 12:08, 25 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Chidgk1: Hi, a bot to automatically tag pages would require an WP:BRFA, and probably wider consensus then currently here. I can just create a list of pages that are uncited and untagged, then they could just be manually tagged? That's what we did for uncited BLPs, see the list at User:ARandomName123/BLP. If there are a lot, we would prefer if you trickled in the tags, but given there's about 4,623 total articles in your wikiproject, it should be fine to just dump them all (preferably after the drive though). ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 19:53, 25 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Using the criteria listed at my comment here, the more stringent scan gives only three pages (Bali Communiqué, Climate change acronyms, Climate change in the Americas), the last two of which I doubt need citations anyways. These three represent roughly 0.07% of the articles in Wikiproject CC, which is similar to the rate I got for BLPs (0.08%).

I also ran the less stringent search mentioned in that comment (only counts inline refs), and there are 61 for your wikiproject. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 22:21, 25 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@ARandomName123 Thanks - how do I see that list of 61 please? Chidgk1 (talk) 11:26, 27 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for the late reply. I've been away from my computer the last couple days, but should be returning tomorrow. I'll post the list then. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 14:36, 30 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Chidgk1: I've pasted the list here. Number count is slightly off (54), I accidentally left disambiguation pages in the count. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 20:54, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Top 21 URA leaderboard for June 2025 (Marathon rules)

Congratulations and thanks to everyone who contributed to the WP:JUN25 Unreferenced Article Backlog Drive. The goal of reducing the backlog of tagged articles to 50,000 was achieved on June 30, through a heroic ~~final-day~~ penultimate-day effort which saw 715 articles gain citations.

The Reviews section of the backlog drive is technically still in progress – participants have until end of day on July 7 to accumulate more points by completing Reviews (and avoid point deductions by addressing issues identified by Reviewers).

However, for those of you who are now addicted to adding citations to Unreferenced articles – the action does not stop. You can keep going as part of the URA 2025 Marathon, which requires no special edit summaries or signups...the bot is simply counting every instance of an editor removing/replacing an {{Unreferenced}} tag.

You can track the yearly leaderboard here. Please note, editors' names do not show up on the yearly leaderboard until you reach 5 points in a single month. (But if you click on "July", you'll see the detailed view with every single editors' diffs.)

Great to see the strong momentum kicking off the month of July...and in the meantime please also see the Top 21 URA leaderboard for June 2025 under Marathon rules...which includes all editors with at least 100 points.


Rank	User	Total articles in June 2025
1	Frost	1191
2	JTtheOG	871
3	Davidindia	449
4	Lulusword	438
5	Cielquiparle	386
6	Silver seren	380
7	Luis7M	364
8	Nayyn	357
9	Liandrei	332
10	AwerDiWeGo	299
11	KhoaNguyen1	274
12	Local Internet User	191
13	Bearian	185
14	Secretlondon	173
15	Toweli	137
16	JoeNMLC	125
17	DeemDeem52	123
18	The joy of all things	109
19	Yiosie2356	104
20	Cakelot1	103
21	FictionWitch	100

Brilliant work and happy referencing! Cielquiparle (talk) 18:51, 1 July 2025 (UTC) Amended. Cielquiparle (talk) 06:29, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It was fun... and amazing work by User:JTtheOG, who was pipped by a stunning late push by @User:Frost.

Two of us User:TheSlumPanda with the support a few more who did the India articles, managed to reduce the India specific backlog by over 500.

Thanks to all the organisers, and happy referencing! Davidindia (talk) 19:12, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Great work on the India-specific backlog. I think you'll find in the actual June 2025 Unreferenced Articles backlog drive that @JTtheOG is still in the lead...and anything could change until the Reviews stage closes. ;) Impressive work indeed by @Frost and @Davidindia. Cielquiparle (talk) 19:43, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oops, my apoligies to @JTtheOG! Thanks Davidindia (talk) 19:47, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks to everyone who got their name in the leaderboard and others who didn’t get their name here. Thanks again for improving our Wikipedia project. TheSlumPanda (talk) 19:55, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I stopped at over 200 (I hope). Obviously I could lose some through reviews. Secretlondon (talk) 20:03, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like you added citations to more than 200 articles in June (per WP:JUN25)...but you must have forgotten to remove the {{Unreferenced}} (which is what the Marathon counter counts). Hence the discrepancy between the two numbers. Cielquiparle (talk) 20:22, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

No I found loads of articles without the tag and without references. Secretlondon (talk) 20:25, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ah. And so that is a good tip for the Marathon – always add the {{Unreferenced}} tag yourself before untagging it. I do think there is some value to that (beyond personal points) because it informs future analysis in the aggregate. Cielquiparle (talk) 01:52, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ah just released that it's just counting removal of the unreferenced tag. I found loads of articles without references or tag. Secretlondon (talk) 20:24, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Has been great fun, thanks for all the efforts organising! Liandrei (talk) 20:27, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, the drive main page says that it will not end "until July 1, 23:59 UTC", that is, in about three hours. AwerDiWeGo (talk) 20:36, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Yes I've been continuing today ;) Secretlondon (talk) 21:10, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Mistake!!! In the past I have always been milking it to the bitter end. Not sure how I messed that up but thanks to everyone kept going on July 1 and hope you stick around for the rest of July as well (and the rest of 2025 and/or until we eliminate the backlog). Cielquiparle (talk) 01:57, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's kind of incredible that 21 people managed to get over 100 points, even if that isn't exclusively just referencing articles. In every month past this year that number was 2 to 7 people, depending on the month, getting to 100. So that's a massive difference. Silver seren^C 21:38, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This has been a great experience. My exp in wikipedia has been limited to just writing articles I know about, template error clean-ups, and adding references where I can. I honestly thought that if I could do 100 edits during this run, it will be good enough, but I am motivated by everyone who is ahead of me, making me want to do better. I am glad I took the leap of faith and join this drive. Thank you for organising, and to participants, please give yourself huge pat in the back! Lulusword (talk) 23:51, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the update! The final count from the drive was a decrease of 9,509 articles, great work everybody! ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 03:25, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you @Cielquiparle and the rest of the team for setting this up, was a lot of fun and happy to take part here! Nayyn (talk) 09:47, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]