User:Peterdownunder/Sandbox2

The standards that we are requiring for GA is much higher than the criteria spell out. Our practice no longer aligned with our rules. In fact most recent GAs should have been VGA. This has reduced the number of articles reaching GA standard. I suggest that we rethink exactly what is needed for GA and VGA status. I think the high standard is fine for VGA, but the criteria need to match what we have been demanding. The standards for GA needs to be lowered, to match our existing criteria. I also wonder about the proposal mechanisms in view of articles being proposed which simply do not meet the criteria.

Requirements for good articles

1. The article must be in Simple English. Where complex words or concepts are necessary, then they are linked.
2. The article must be about a subject which belongs in Wikipedia. There is no use improving articles that do not belong here, and better fit another wiki, like Wikibooks, Wikispecies, or Wiktionary.
3. The article must meet our guidelines on notability, BLP, etc.
4. The article must follow our Manual of Style.
5. The article must be fairly complete. Usually, articles should be a few kilobytes long, although shorter pages may also be nominated.
6. The article must have gone through a number of revisions/reviews by different editors. No one writes perfect articles.
7. The article must be filed in the appropriate category. It must have at least one interwiki link.
8. The last few revisions should be minor changes (like spell-checking or link-fixing).
9. All important terms should be linked and there must be no red links. Usually the important word or phrase is only linked the first time it occurs.
10. There should be pictures related to the article. They must also be properly labelled.
11. There must be no templates pointing to the fact that the article needs improvement. Some of these templates are {{complex}}, {{cleanup}}, {{stub}}, {{unreferenced}} and {{wikify}}. The article also should not need them.
12. Content that is from books, journal articles or other publications must be referenced.

Requirements for very good articles

1. The article must have meet all requirements for Good Article status.
2. The article must be comprehensive. A comprehensive article is one which does not miss any major facts and details.
3. The article should be several kilobytes long, not including infoboxes, images, references, other websites, interwiki, and categories. However, this is not a strict rule.
4. The last few revisions should be minor changes (like spell-checking or link-fixing).
5. Content that is from books, journal articles or other publications needs to be referenced. This can either be done with <ref>..</ref><references/> tags, or as a list of publications. For articles that have references or external links on the English Wikipedia, there must be at least one in the Simple English article as well.