Archive:Article of the Week

What is the Article of the Week?

The Article of the Week is an article chosen by vote among Citizens as exemplifying various qualities we like to see in a Citizendium article; see our article standards.

Current nominees

The next article (or draft) of the week will be the article with the most votes at 1 AM UTC on Wednesday, 15 April 2009.

Nominated article	Score	Supporters	Specialist supporters

Previous winning articles

Korematsu v. United States: A U.S. Supreme Court case, in which the internment of Japanese-Americans was deemed constitutional due to military necessity [e] (Apr 7)  Orchid: Any plant classified under Orchidaceae, one of the largest plant families and the largest among Monocotyledons. [e] (Mar 31)  Oliver Cromwell: (1599-1658) English soldier, statesman, and leader of the Puritan revolution, nicknamed "Old Ironsides". [e] (Mar 24)  Wisconsin v. Yoder: 1972 U.S. Supreme Court decision in which it was held that the constitutional rights of the Amish, under the "free exercise of religion" clause, were violated by the state's compulsory school attendance law. [e] (Mar 17)  Conventional coal-fired power plant: power plant that burns coal in a steam generator to produce high pressure steam, which goes to steam turbines that generate electricity. [e] (Mar 10)  Battle of the Ia Drang: First divisional-scale battle involving helicopter-borne air assault troops, with U.S. forces against those of North Vietnam [e] (Mar 3)  Ether (physics): Medium that can carry electromagnetic waves (obsolete) [e] (Feb 24)  Large-scale trickle filters: One of the processes by which biodegradable substances in wastewaters are biochemically oxidized. [e] (11 Feb)  Homeopathy: System of alternative medicine involving administration of highly diluted substances with the intention to stimulate the body's natural healing processes, not considered proven by mainstream science. [e] (28 Jan)  Microeconomics: A branch of economics that deals with transactions between suppliers and consumers, acting individually or in groups. [e] (14 Jan)  Speech Recognition: The ability to recognize and understand human speech, especially when done by computers. [e] (26 Nov)  Mashup: A data visualization created by combining data with multiple computer applications. [e] (19 Nov)  Tux: The name of the penguin, official logo and cartoon mascot for the Linux computer operating system. [e] (14 Oct)  Hydrogen bond: A non-covalent and non-ionic chemical bond involving a hydrogen atom and either Fluorine, Nitrogen, or Oxygen. [e] (7 Oct)  Lead: Chemical element number 82, a corrosion-resistant, dense, ductile heavy metal known to cause neurological problems. [e] (1 Sept)  DNA: A macromolecule — chemically, a nucleic acid — that stores genetic information. [e] (8 July)  Augustin-Louis_Cauchy: (1789 – 1857) prominent French mathematician, one of the pioneers of rigor in mathematics and complex analysis. [e] (1 July)  Vasco da Gama: Portuguese explorer who established a sea route from Europe to India. [e] (24 June)  Phosphorus: Chemical element (Z=15) vital to life and widely used in fertilizers, detergents and pesticides. [e] (17 June)  Crystal Palace: A glass and iron structure built to house the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, London, in 1851. It was moved and rebuilt on Sydenham Hill in 1854 but was destroyed by fire in 1936. [e] (10 June)  Gross Domestic Product: Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is a total of the outputs recorded in a country’s national income accounts. [e] (3 June)  RNA interference: Process that inhibits the flow of genetic information to protein synthesis. [e] (27 May)  Latino history: History of Hispanics in the U.S., especially those of Mexican origins. [e] (20 May)  Navy Grog: Rum-based drink. [e] (13 May)  Systems biology: The study of biological systems as a whole. [e] (6 May)  Steroid: Hormone group that controls metabolism, catabolism, growth, electrolyte balance and sexual characteristics. [e] (22 Apr)  Lebanon: a country in the Middle East. It borders Syria to the north and east, Israel to the south, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Its official language is Arabic, although French is widely spoken. The capital and largest city of Lebanon is Beirut. [e] (15 Apr)  Wheat: Grass crop grown worldwide and used in making flour and fermentation for alcohol production. [e] (7 Apr)  Benjamin Franklin: 1706-1790, American statesman and scientist, based in Philadelphia. [e] (1 Apr)  Coherer: A type of radio detector, popular in the earliest days of radio development, beginning around 1890. [e] (25 Mar)  U.S. Civil War: {1861-65) war by the U.S. to prevent 11 of its states (the Confederate States of America) from seceding; won by the U.S. after the death of 600,000 people and the abolishment of slavery. [e] (18 Mar)  Life: Living systems, of which biologists seek the commonalities distinguishing them from non-living systems. [e] (11 Mar)  Petroleum refining processes: The chemical engineering processes used in petroleum refining. [e] (4 Mar)  Shirley Chisholm: The first African-American congresswoman, serving from 1969-1983, representing New York's 12th Congressional District. [e] (20 Feb)  Telephone Newspaper: A telephone-based news service in the first years after market introduction of the telephone. [e] (4 Feb)  Wristwatch: Timepiece designed to be worn around the wrist. [e] (28 Jan)

Korean War of 1592-1598: Fought on the Korean peninsula from 1592 to 1598 between Japan and the Chinese tributary alliance (Korea, China, Ryukyus, Java, etc.), and resulted in Japanese retreat. [e] (21 Jan)  Andrew Carnegie: 1835-1919, Scottish-American steel maker, philanthropist and peace activist [e] (11 January 2008) Bowling: Please do not use this term in your topic list, because there is no single article for it. Please substitute a more precise term. See Bowling (disambiguation) for a list of available, more precise, topics. Please add a new usage if needed. (31 December 2007)  Architecture: The art and technique of designing and constructing buildings to fulfill both practical and aesthetic purposes. [e] (December 6)  Civil society: The space for social activity outside the market, state and household; the arena of uncoerced collective action around shared interests, purposes and values. [e] November 29  Joan of Arc: A French peasant girl (ca. 1412 – 1431) who led her nation's armies during the Hundred Years' War and became a national heroine and saint. [e] (November 22)  Chemistry: The science of matter, or of the electrical or electrostatical interactions of matter. [e] (November 15)  Albert Gallatin: 1761-1849, Swiss born American statesman and anthropologist [e] (November 8)  Prime number: A number that can be evenly divided by exactly two positive whole numbers, namely one and itself. [e] (November 1)  Tennis: A sport played on a hard-surfaced rectangular court, between either two players or two teams of two players each, in which the players attempt to strike a hollow rubber ball, using a stringed raquet, over a net into the opponent's half of the court. [e] (October 25)  Rottweiler: A large breed of dog known for its great physical strength and strong protective instinct. [e] (October 18)  Theodor Lohmann: A 19th century (1831-1905) German administrative lawyer, civil servant and social reformer, second in importance only to Otto von Bismarck in the formation of the German social insurance system. [e] (October 9)  William Shakespeare: Add brief definition or description (October 2)  Edward I: Add brief definition or description (September 25)  El Tío: Add brief definition or description (September 18)  Scotland Yard: Add brief definition or description (September 11)  Kilt: Add brief definition or description (September 4)  U.S. Electoral College: Add brief definition or description (August 28)  Butler: Add brief definition or description (August 21)  Tony Blair: Add brief definition or description (August 14)  Northwest Passage: Add brief definition or description (August 7)  Literature: Add brief definition or description (July 31)  Biology: Add brief definition or description (July 25)

Rules and procedure

Nomination

• To nominate an article, simply create a new row at the bottom of the current nominees list. Use the {{AOTW row}} template. Then alphabetize your nomination, making sure it is not placed above nominees with more votes than your nominee.
• The article's status must be 0 or 1, i.e., only "Advanced Articles" may be nominated.
• Any Citizen may nominate an article.
• No Citizen may have nominated more than one article listed under "current nominees" at a time.
• The article's nominator is indicated simply by the first name in the list of votes (see below).
• At least for now--while the project is still small--you may nominate and vote for articles of which you are a main author.
• An article can be Article of the Week only once every six months. Nominated articles that have won top honors should be removed from the list.
• Comments on nominations should be made on the article's talk page.

Voting

• To vote, simply add your name and date next to an article title, after other nominations in the "Supporters" area, by signing ~~~~ (four tildes). (The date is necessary so that we can determine when the last vote was added.)
• You may vote for as many articles as you wish, and each vote counts separately, but you can only nominate one at a time; see above. You could, theoretically, vote for every nominated article on the page.
• Add your name in the "Specialist supporters" column only if you are an editor who is an expert about the topic in question. Your vote will be counted as three.

Ranking

• Nominations are listed by number of votes first, then alphabetically.
• Admins should make sure the votes are correctly tallied, but anyone may do this. Note that "Specialist Votes" are worth three.

Deleting

• If the list of nominees should be kept to 20 (or some similar reasonable number). Nominees that have very few supporters and which have not garnered any new supporters in the last, say, two weeks may be deleted to make room for new nominees. (We'll have to solidify this rule.)
• Any editor may, simply by editing the nomination list (or the talk page), entirely cancel the nomination of any unapproved article in his or her area of expertise (if, for example, it contains obvious and embarrassing problems).

Choosing the weekly winner

• Each Tuesday (at 7 PM UTC; 2 PM EST; 11 AM PST; 4 AM Sydney), one of the program admins--the first one who has the honor--moves the article that is at the top of the list (i.e., the one with the most votes) to the front page, announces the winner on Citizendium-L and updates the "previous winning articles" section accordingly.
• If you are volunteering to change the article of the week on the front page, then say so above the "article nominees" table ("I'm doing the honors this time" -- Jane Doe) so that no one else does it.
• If an article has not been approved yet, the article of the week is re-labelled "Draft of the Week." Be sure to pay attention to this!
• When updating the main page, be sure to change the [more...] link at the bottom to match the new article as well.

In the event of a tie

Where two or more articles have achieved an equal number of votes, the following procedure shall be used to break the deadlock:

• Number of specialist supporters: the article with most specialist supporters goes through.

Should this fail to produce a winner:

• Alphabetical order: The article appearing first by English alphabetical order shall be named Article of the Week.
• The remaining winning articles are guaranteed this position in the following weeks, again in alphabetical order. No further voting would take place on these, which remain at the top of the table with notices to that effect.
• Further nominations and voting take place to determine future winning articles for the following weeks.

Administrators

These are people who have volunteered to run this program. Their duties are (1) to ensure that this page remains "clean," e.g., as a given article garners more votes, its tally is accurately represented and it moves up the list, and (2) to place the winning article on the front page each Tuesday at 7 PM UTC (Wednesday, 4 AM Sydney; Wednesday, 3 AM Hong Kong; 2 PM EST; 11 AM PST).

To become an administrator, you need not apply anywhere. Simply add your name below. Administrator duties are open to editors and authors alike.

• Carl Jantzen
• Todd Coles
• David E. Volk

Other periodical community content initiatives

• CZ:New Draft of the Week
• CZ:Monthly Write-a-Thon

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