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Advice: use most recent high quality image of a person (and maybe subject) when featuring them

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An illustration using the three 2024 examples
Conviction
Attempted assassination
Election

There was a discussion shortly after the 2024 election concerning the use of Trump's 2017 official portrait. I've always championed the use of the most recent high quality, portraitesque free image available, since we are talking about current events. We generally use the image most recently adopted as the lead image in biographical articles, which can sometimes cause issues if it has newer, higher quality images; this is especially the case for people with "official photographs," which tend to be locked in as the lead image for potentially the rest of the article's lifespan.

I think that the 2024 portrait was particularly egregious since it deliberately is a throwback to the start of a man's first term 7 years afterwards when he's prepping for his second term. When Trump and Bolsonaro had his indictments and convictions respectively in 2023, I edited the nombox to include the most recent high quality portrait image we had of them, and these were included in the subsequent postings of Trump (example), and partially for Bolsonaro (the poster used a slightly better image taken around the time of the nominated image). However, I grew less involved in ITN in 2024, and so this wasn't replicated for Trump's conviction, attempted assassination, or election. I was able to do this for the recent Hungarian election, though that was partially since that image was briefly being used as the lead image in Peter Magyar's article already, before being replaced again with his MEP portrait.

Anyway, I'm not making this into a formal rule change for WP:CREEP reasons (though if anyone cares, it could be made into such), but generally speaking, I think editors should look to use the most recent high quality, portrait-able images of living people in an ITN nom. Exceptions obviously go for RDs and what not. I could also see this be extended to any subject like a building, but for obvious reasons, that would be more difficult to determine.

I should note that this already seems to be the norm outside of ITN, where outside the main articles, usage of images of politicians (who this mainly affects) tend to use the most recent portraitable image at the time of editing, while the main articles use the most recent official portrait. Trump is the best example, where WP:FORK articles like this one use a more contemporary portrait while the main article uses the 2025 official portrait. I even have a draft article that used a contemporary portrait of Trump that someone actually edited to include an even more recent photo of him. — Knightoftheswords 22:10, 31 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]

I don't expect posting admins to do an image search on ITN blurbs before posting. If that's true, then the image selection process is entirely in the nomination itself. This means that anyone could search for a better, more high-quality or more-relevant image for a subject during the nomination/voting process. A problem might be that there is no clearly responsible party, but I know some fellow editors (like Andrew) are interested in the images we use, so I'm sure we can present some of Commons' best work, as a team. I don't have much of an opinion on the Trump portraits. They're all official government photographs with high levels of detail. Recency of the picture is really the only objective measure to distinguish between them. As discussed in a section above, I think these are the least interesting Commons work we can feature in general, so it's hard to have much of an opinion. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 06:33, 1 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I think you need to be more precise about what do 'most recent' and 'high quality' mean in this regard. What if we have a very recent photo of low quality? --Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 07:24, 1 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Then you don’t use it. I said “use the most recent, high quality image”; high quality as in able to be used as a clear, portrait/portraitesque depiction of the subject, ala the examples above. — Knightoftheswords 13:56, 2 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
What would be the quality parameters (e.g. pixel size, crop, perspective, sharpness, noise etc.) and how would we define which photo meets the quality requirements? One easy way is to consider all portraits that have attained the FP, QI or VI status on Wikimedia Commons as quality enough, but many portraits are unvetted and we’d therefore need another way to define minimum quality. --Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 16:58, 2 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
That's why I specifically avoided making this a policy proposal since (like almost all image discussions on WP), it's largely up to consensus/nominators/admins on a case-by-case basis. Generally, these images should be of decent resolution (for an image of the size on the MP), and be portraitesque (i.e., clear perspective of the individuals face and what not). Essentially it should be expected to be the lead image in the article if (in the examples above for instance) there were no official portraits available. — Knightoftheswords 17:19, 2 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think we need to favour portraits any more than we already do. Discussion above already showed that some editors (myself included) are tired of official portraits and would appreciate more variation in image choice, if possible. Even just a picture of a politician celebrating a victory could probably be preferred over an official portrait. Of course the ideal would be to use pictures taken by Commons volunteers as much as possible. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 06:48, 3 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, that’s kind of what I’m saying; we don’t have to use official portraits as images. Just recent good photos of them. — Knightoftheswords 15:35, 3 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
  • I am unsure what the purpose of this discussion is, as you don't have a "recent" concern. The Trump 2024 photo was a while ago, and I believe each photo used can be individually discussed if needed. Many times, the photo used is an admin decision, as they have to submit the photo for protection, and I believe they already use a high quality recent photo if available. Natg 19 (talk) 17:32, 2 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
    I used the Trump examples since they’re the most prominent, numerous (since he’s a newsworthy fella), and includes examples of this being done. There are more recent examples (for instance the later Bolsonaro conviction posting used his old 2019 portrait). Articles tend to already use the most recent high quality image for BLPs, so this isn’t too much an issue, but for folks who often will have older photos as their lead image (namely [especially on ITN] politicians from jurisdictions that allow us to freely use their official portraits), we should prolly use good photos that are as contemporary as possible, otherwise we run into an issue akin to Trump where nearly decade old photos from a different part of their career are being used to illustrate a current event (which is also why I used him as an example of things that can go wrong from not following this approach). — Knightoftheswords 23:10, 2 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
    Please don't use the word "prolly"... Concerning your actual point: frankly, I see this as a topic for the individual nominations. If you object to a particular picture proposed there, feel free to raise it. Khuft (talk) 19:06, 6 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
    Do u h8 da term "gonna"? — Knightoftheswords 00:39, 17 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
  • Missed opportunities The OP's point about the choice of image seems to be a non-issue. What's much more of an issue is the continuing WP:LUGO problem of ITN running exactly the same image day after day, so making it look like there's nobody home and/or the section is broken. This would be easy to fix if ITN would just take the opportunity of using the many pictures associated with RD which are currently not used at all. For example, every one of the current RD selection has a free image available and they are more diverse than the usual dictator. But ITN stubbornly refuses to use any of them, even famous faces like Anthony Head. It's such a waste. Andrew🐉(talk) 07:48, 8 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
    I used to oppose this idea, but I think I've undergone a change in my attitudes. The "nobody's home" problem is getting bad. I support any sort of trial run. I see it working. Bremps... 01:04, 16 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
  • If we're gonna keep being very stingy with our blurbs, I like the idea of using RD to feature a different image if we haven't had an image update for a day or two. Not sure what quality judgment we should use for them. Maybe a template to nominate an image update for people to !vote on would be nice. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 07:59, 8 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
    I have thought about this in the past and am okay with it as long as non of the blurbs have good images available. — Knightoftheswords 19:04, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Sham elections

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At various points, I have seen I have seen the argument that an WP:ITNR election should not be posted because it is not free and fair, or that an election blurb should be qualified to note that an election was not free and fair. Those arguments have been met with, more or less, "Disregarded. Start a discussion at WT:ITN." This most recently occurred at the currently nominated Guinean parliamentary election. Nobody yet has, so I figure I might as well. Authoritarian regimes stage elections which are not democratic in order to promote the legitimacy of their governments. I do not like ITN parroting and placing authoritarian propaganda on the front page of Wikipedia. It is the antithesis of this project's mission. I believe that relevant guidance should be added to ITNR, something along the lines of: For sham elections which are not free and fair, editors should assess whether there is any actual importance in the election (as in the 2020 Belarusian presidential election). They should also decide whether to use language signifying legitimacy (e.g., "elected") or language not (e.g., "declared the winner"). Such decisions should be based in the coverage of reliable sources. 1brianm7 (talk) 13:49, 10 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

the urge to call out sham elections is a problem along the lines of WP:RGW. Elections that are considered sham by reputable sources that have authority to call those out should of course be documented at the election article, but at ITN we must stay factually neutral and simply report the election happened. The best we can do is avoid language like "won (the election)" that imply a free and fair election, and use alternative terms. In general ITN blurbs are not a place to try to incorporate controversial language because a blurb lacks the required space to provide the context and referencing per NPOV. Masem (t) 14:10, 10 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
What's the basis for "we must" (my emphasis)? Even RGW's guidance is to follow the lead of reliable sources, which is exactly what's being proposed here.
I don't think we should stop posting non-free/fair elections, but I'm struggling to see a reason why it would be antithetical to have standard ITNR language for elections that high-quality reliable sources are reporting are shams. Ed [talk] [OMT] 14:48, 10 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
what makes an election a sham is a subjective assessment, even if repeated by multiple sources. We should avoid going into subjective matters in a short blurb where we have no space for context and sourcing. Eg if we were to say why the election was considered a sham, we'd have to explain the reasoning and who is making that claim, and there's just nowhere close to the space needed for that. Masem (t) 15:58, 10 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
To be clear, there is no rule against doing so, and editors should feel free to try to compose such a blurb and seek consensus for it. Just understand this is well-trodden territory and prior efforts to do so have failed. GreatCaesarsGhost 17:30, 10 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I think it's important to link to articles on sham elections if we can get them to a certain level of quality. It's the best opportunity we have to highlight the political situation in a country like this. The Guinea government claims that they have made the final move from military control to a democracy? Let's direct people's attention to this subject. Right now, we could assume people know nothing about this subject, and that's surely worse. (Though of course, mainly, we want to highlight the article written by our fellow editors who put the work in). ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 16:39, 10 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
yes, if the election is being called a sham by a majority of sources, the quality check at ITN should be make sure that aspect is appropriately discussed in a manner that meets NPOV. Masem (t) 16:51, 10 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
This question has been raised numerous times and the consensus has roundly rejected excluding sham elections from ITNR. However, we should always keep top of mind that ITNR is an exception to significance debate, not quality. Articles about sham elections are often very low quality, and Guinea is a clear example of that. There is often little of substance to say, as the characteristics of an election that make it interesting are not present. GreatCaesarsGhost 17:25, 10 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Omitting elections because they aren't democratic is not a compelling argument. That only shows that the English Wikipedia community is biased towards 'democracy' and disregards all other forms of governments. In fact, neutrality is best achieved when editors apply positive and refrain from normative reasoning. --Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 07:17, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
This is a ridiculous position. It's not biased to admit the reality that actual free and open elections are a pivotal part of the functioning of a democracy, whereas sham 'elections' are largely publicity stunts that make no difference to the operation of authoritarian states. GenevieveDEon (talk) 15:25, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
this iterates the WP:RGW stance that I pointed out above. It is wanting to point out sham elections but this is where we need to keep neutral and not treat these, on the context of a one sentence blurb, different from other elections. On the article page is where we go into the appropriate statements and attribution on why it was considered sham, where there is space for that context. Masem (t) 17:15, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I think some editors will never understand what we’re talking about, so it’s a complete waste of time to reiterate things over and over again. The opposition to sham elections is akin to a recent proposal here that we shouldn’t post pictures of politicians because they’re corrupt. --Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 18:05, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, no - you misunderstand me. I don't oppose posting pictures of politicians, corrupt or otherwise, and I don't oppose the posting of rigged elections. What I want is for our headlines to reflect the preponderance of reliable sources in describing sham elections as what they are, rather than giving the false impression that they are equivalent to free and fair elections. I don't consider that to be an unreasonable bias in favour of democratic regimes; I consider it to be giving due weight to sources. GenevieveDEon (talk) 18:31, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
This thread is about why sham elections are opposed because they’re sham, not whether the blurb should indicate they’re not free and fair. We have a problem with editors who cannot divorce from their emotions and views, so talking about the wording of the blurb should come after we sort out that problem and make sure that sham elections should be included. --Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 19:05, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Just because reliable sources who are otherwise not the authorities to declare something is X or not are calling something X doesn't mean we should repeat that for purposes of ITN. In terms of elections there is no official body that can really say if an election is a sham or not. Contrast this to the relative recent statement from the UN that the actions of Israel were likely a genocide, thete being an agency with such creditials. This is a common problem across the board that just because a wide swath of non authoratative RSes claim a controversial position is true does not mean WP should adopt the stance that that is true in wikivoice. In article space we have the room to cover that per WEIGHT, but the ITN is not the place to do that. Masem (t) 21:45, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think the comparison with the Gaza genocide is apt as the word 'genocide' is already included in the article's name, but the main point that Wikipedia shouldn't adopt any stance driven by what's written in reliable sources is spot-on. Using a qualifier in the blurb that an election was sham is equivalent to saying that a sport team utterly defeated another team in a one-sided match (e.g. note that we didn't mention that PSG outclassed Inter in the 2025 UEFA Champions League final despite the fact that the result was obvious and the coverage in reliable sources pointed out to the scoreline). Such qualifiers clearly violate WP:NEUTRALITY. --Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 07:43, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
"that make no difference to the operation of authoritarian states" – I wonder if there's an alternative way we could cover the operations of authoritarian states that could be covered in ITN every once in a while. The death of a dictator is the obvious one, but that can be once in a multiple decade event. A concern I have, is that by not featuring authoritarian regimes in ITN, we only push human rights abuses out of sight even more. I think there is a lot we could do to improve our coverage of (for example) Guinea in general, but also it is nice if we can feature the articles we write about them when they are in the news at all. I'm open for alternative ideas here though. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 07:53, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
We should not exclude "sham elections", this could disproportionately affect non-Western countries and perpetuate Wikipedia's systemic bias. I don't agree with the assertion that the word "win"/"winning" necessarily implies democratic legitimacy or an endorsement of the results. It is also very subjective as to what qualifies as a "sham election"; does it include cases where opposition parties are stifled (Guinea) or is it only cases where numbers are fabricated (Venezuela)? Such discussions only stall a nomination's posting.
As this argument comes up far too often, I attempted to add a clarification to WP:ITNELECTIONS but was reverted by an administrator; hopefully this means that more admins can step in and state that "sham elections" are still ITN/R so we can avoid having the same repetitive conversation over and over and over and over again. Nice4What (talk · contribs) ♥ 21:17, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
  • Deprecate Elections should be judged on their merits rather than being distorted by the nonsense of ITN/R which results in numerous dysfunctions including:
  1. Posting of insignificant elections in microstates such as Niue which has a population of less than two thousand people.
  2. Posting of sham elections which are not significant because the results are largely pre-determined kayfabe and so have no effect
  3. Failure to post elections which are actually significant such as the election of Zohran Mamdani or the recent UK elections.

Andrew🐉(talk) 23:06, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The exclusion of microstates would disproportionately affect Pacific and Caribbean states, which could perpetuate Wikipedia's systemic bias. Also, where do we make the cut off for a sufficient population size? Seems quite arbitrary. Nice4What (talk · contribs) ♥ 23:20, 11 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
You could always balance it against article quality. It would be a bit subjective, but article quality is subjective already anyway, so the biggest difference would be that lower-quality articles get featured less often. I would like this idea if ITN-voters actually looked at article quality at all. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 07:55, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I think we do suffer from a tendency to believe that ITRN candidates "should" be posted absent major problems, as opposed to being judged objectively on their quality. If the proposed SIGNIF deprecation goes forward, it should help reduce this.GreatCaesarsGhost 11:28, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
ITN/R is an explicit systemic bias, distorting the normal process of assessing significance. ITN ought to be covering major elections in the English-speaking world such as those for the Mayor of NYC, the UK's devolved governments and the Indian state legislative assemblies. Our readership is clearly very interested in these topics and ITN fails to cover them. It's biased. Andrew🐉(talk) 12:14, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
ITNR/more lenient assessments could get there without removing coverage about elections worldwide. Frankly I agree; way too much weight is assigned to whether elections are ITNR. I think frankly that it's bogus that we post the elections in every little Pacific or Caribbean island that get little global attention, yet there was a kneejerk reaction to posting Mamdani's election just because "it's subnational", "American politics", "not ITNR", etc., even though that infinitely received much more sustained coverage and dare I say may be of even greater importance than a PM change in Antigua. It's important to realize that WP:SYSTEMICBIAS is not a way to legitimize WP:RGW (a belief that I think is a hidden, but large force on ITN). However, that should not justify nullifying elections from places people do live in just because it's "too small". We can post national elections from small microstates where people do indeed live in, and have their lives affected by said elections as a result, while also being able to have the common sense to acknowledge that a thing called In the news should be able to highlight the importance and coverage of the recent NYC mayoral election, which has a similar level of importance, if not more. Stuff like it is objectively worthy of posting, and not just due to the coverage it received. Not everything is SYSTEMICBIAS; sometimes, there are places (in this case, cities) that indeed, are objectively of greater significance than others. — Knightoftheswords 19:16, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Andrew, this is not the topic of this discussion. This is about countries whose elections don't adhere to democratic norms, not your tedious vendetta against small nations. GenevieveDEon (talk) 10:43, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep as is, per Nice4What. The current way we post blurbs is simply to state that an election took place, and who won it, without further commentary. That is unambiguous, easy to apply with boilerplate wording, and avoids the need for endless wrangling over what level of freedom each country enjoys. It's never wrong to say an election took place, but it's sometimes wrong to say outright that it was free and fair or it wasn't free and fair,and all the nuance around that is generally discussed in detail in the linked article.  — Amakuru (talk) 13:19, 12 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

OP of thread, responding to everything I just do not think it is factually neutral that, when authoritarian states put on fake elections to propagate legitimacy, doing so because democratic states put on real elections from which their legitimacy is derived, we insist that we must treat the fake elections designed to imitate real elections the same as real ones. I can get behind the argument that its important to post elections in Barbados because people are electing the leader of one of the 200 highest level jurisdictions in the world, even if their impact is probably less than the comptroller of NYC, but that's only because the people are actually deciding. For most sham elections, the government does not derive any actual legitimacy from it, and the result is never in doubt. I acknowledge that this would make discussions take longer and more ambiguous. That's unfortunate. But I just can't get behind the argument that its more important we lessen the awfulness of making the sausage when it makes ITN worse. A lot has been said about WP:RGW, but that says we base articles on secondary and independent sources, giving appropriate weight to the balance of informed opinion. No informed opinion is treating these elections as legitimate. We shouldn't either. I see the argument that this would result in less postings from the Global South, and that is unfortunate, but what actual significance do most of these sham elections have. I could get behind posting sham elections when they represent a changing of the guard, e.g. if Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo doesn't run for reelection in 2029, but they just usually don't mean anything. I also just don't know if these types of articles, whose encyclopedic significance I am doubtful for, are properly fit for including information about humans right abuses and whatnot. I also think it would be relatively easy to include appropriate context: "In Guinea's first legislative elections since the 2021 coup, President Mamady Doumbouya's coalition, the Generation for Modernity and Development, win the most seats in the National Assembly." includes so much superfluous information and links to awful articles, we could very well have run "In Guinea's first legislative elections since the 2021 coup, supporters of President Mamady Doumbouya win the most seats in the National Assembly after banning major opposition parties.". It's shorter! And To be clear, there is no rule against doing so, and editors should feel free to try to compose such a blurb and seek consensus for it. that's not my experience: blurbs have been posted with "declared the winner", and admins have unilaterally changed it to "wins". I wonder if the apparent consensus here, that we cannot decide against posting sham elections and that we must not make any distinction with real elections in the blurb, would be approved by the broader community. 1brianm7 (talk) 20:27, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

it boils down to ITN not being the place to put such elections in doubt. Article space had lots of room to provide the sources that assert an election is a sham, and when thats DUE to include, it absolutely should be in the article, and should be part of the quality check at ITN. But ITN blurbs must be factually and tonally neutral given how little space we have in the blurb. We have no space to provide the context required of NPOV to explain why an election might be considered a sham. Broadly, ITN should not try to be providing commentary on news Masem (t) 20:46, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
There is perhaps an interesting nugget to dig into there: taking your words at face value, why does ITN get to ignore NPOV? I don't know of any other place on Wikipedia where space concerns override NPOV. Ed [talk] [OMT] 21:44, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
an election happens and a winner is announced. That's objectively factual. Now whether that election is fair or a sham, that becomes a matter of subjectivity that us subject to NPOV, which means you need to be anld to provide context abd attribution. Even for elections like Russia or North Korea, we cannot factually call those shane elections and require attribution and context for that. So the point is that we are avoid wadding into a complex pool of issues by staying yo the surface level, objective fact. Masem (t) 22:04, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I mean, that's essentially WP:FALSEBALANCE by omission. Ed [talk] [OMT] 22:43, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. And as I have pointed out before, there are such organisations as independent election observers, and they are often taken by external media to be reliable sources for the freedom and fairness of elections. It's not like the question of whether an election is free and fair is some kind of mystic imponderable - it's subject to observation and reporting like any other sociological phenomenon. GenevieveDEon (talk) 23:20, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Image rotation

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Sometimes I see images get rotatated, just so that one is not overexposed. Hockney had just under 25 hours. Musk had less than 8 hours. Bajrakitiyabha got upgraded without image usage. Brunson had over 49 hours. Stahl is over 57 hours. Why didn't Bajrakitiyabha ever get an image run. If there is a reason, Musk should get some more time.-TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 03:08, 19 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Per WP:ITNIMAGE: The picture should be for the uppermost blurb possible. Blurbs are ordered chronologically, so generally the most recent event with an image is displayed. Images are mostly only "rotated" if multiple events occurred on the same date, then a different blurb will be swapped with the top. —Bagumba (talk) 03:29, 19 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
@Bagumba: Interestingly, that part of WP:ITNIMAGE seems to be (somewhat) contradicted by the admin instructions in the last paragraph of WP:ITN/A#Images:

It's OK to change an image independently of adding a new blurb, especially if the old image has been up for more than 24–36 hours. Changing the image can be…for an older blurb if the topmost blurb's image has been displayed for an inordinate number of days.

Left guide (talk) 01:57, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think it's contradicting, but rather supplementing. The text with the ellipsis (emphasis addded), Changing the image can be in response to a message on WP:ERRORS, to switch between multiple images relevant to the blurb, or ... could still be the uppermost possible blurb. The inordinate clause is consistent with WP:IAR. However, the 3 days (at the time) that Staal had been up seems quite different than the Lugo case. Still, the community can choose to make inordinate more objective, if it chooses. —Bagumba (talk) 04:41, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Adding a section for "known to be forthcoming nominations"

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Would there be any interest in having a section on the main ITC page, at the very bottom, for forthcoming news items that we know are supposed to happen or likely to happen in the next 7 days, which then can be moved manually to the proper date when they happen? The news that we're going to see the UK PM resign or announcement steps towards resignation on Monday is a good example where this section would be helpful, so that editors know they can try to start working on it. Similarly, things like the known ends of sports competitions or entertainment awards like Oscars or Emmys, where the conclusion is known to happen on a specific day or for things like NBA Finals, within a week's frame. Items would just be added to a single section (no dated), using the standard template, and then when the event actually occurs, the existing one can be moved to the correct date.

This should not be used for stories where the date is very unclear. For example, and I'm not suggesting this would actually be an ITN, but we are waiting for the US Supreme Court's on birthright citizenship, which should be announced in the next couple weeks, but there could be reasons it might not happen in that time frame. This type of story would not be good to be nominated. Masem (t) 01:35, 21 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]

  • The Starmer story was nominated at ITN/C and then speedily closed in about an hour. If it had been left open, I would have observed that the German-language ITN has already posted an item on their main page:

    Andy Burnham, möglicher Herausforderer von Premierminister Keir Starmer um den Vorsitz der britischen Labour Party, hat die Nachwahl in Makerfield und damit einen Sitz im House of Commons gewonnen.

    Andy Burnham, a potential challenger to Prime Minister Keir Starmer for the leadership of the British Labour Party, has won the by-election in Makerfield and thus a seat in the House of Commons.

    I contemplated nominating the Makerfield result here but it seemed a waste of time because just about everything gets opposed at the English ITN. The result is that ITN has been leading on an ice-hockey game for a week now rather than reporting what's actually in the news.
Building on the OP's suggestion, what might help is a green room or newsdesk page, where ITN regulars discuss what's in the news and what ITN is or isn't doing about it. Newbies might be encouraged to go there first to discuss potential nominations. And it should start with the contents of Portal:current events which provides a convenient list of likely topics. Its focus should be productive suggestions rather than adversarial !votes. It should be a separate page because ITN/C is already too bloated and this causes technical trouble.
Andrew🐉(talk) 06:56, 21 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
We are not a newspaper and ITN shouldn't feature stories that are leading up to a bigger one, we should post only when there's a clear point of no return. Speculative stories, even if the media dig into them, are not good topics for ITN. That's why I'm talking of stories that we know are going to a well-established "likely to post" impact at ITN, such as would be Starmer's resignation. There's still details whether it will be a long or fast transition would could impact posting, but if that does happen, it will certainly be posted at some point or another, and in the case of this suggestion, prepping an article about it if the event happens Monday would make sense. Masem (t) 12:04, 21 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I've been thinking a calendar for ITNR items might help in this regard, since the individual events generally seem to occur around the same time each year. Maybe transclude the current and upcoming month at the bottom of the candidate page. Left guide (talk) 07:41, 21 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with the overall premise of this idea. But I disagree with the example of Starmer, as it is very speculative and there is no "guarantee" of his resignation until it actually happens. I find it odd that you cite the SCOTUS decision as having an unknown timeframe, as this is the same for the Starmer resignation (he could resign on Monday or not at all). This "known to be forthcoming nominations" should be used for clear, defined ITN/R events such as finals of sporting events (US Open (golf) ending today 6/21), entertainment awards, fixed elections etc (which are all guaranteed to occur at fixed intervals). Natg 19 (talk) 21:38, 21 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I think it would be ideal if we were able to present potential blurbs before officially nominating them. I think this would clean up a lot of situations; in particular a lot less wasted energy on "wait until the final results are in" or "not quite ready yet ; oh don't worry I'm planning on expanding this afternoon." We would allow people to put their attention on actually improving articles instead of just making a binary decision. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 07:19, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
No. ITNC is not a venue for coordinating work of any sort on improving and updating articles on future events, but to discuss whether nominated current events are notable enough and their articles are of sufficient quality. If you want to improve the workflow around articles documenting current (and scheduled future) events, then Wikipedia:WikiProject Current events is perhaps what you're looking for. --Kiril Simeonovski (talk) 10:16, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Why not? This sounds like a decent plan to me. Natg 19 (talk) 17:08, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
there's a reason I suggested this is limited to events that are known to or very very likely to happen within a seven day window. For example its far too soon for the final World Cup match to be included here. Masem (t) 18:13, 22 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that it would need to be for very short timescales, as a staging area of incomplete blurb proposals. It's common for people to propose a feature of elections or eclipses or the like ~24 hours before they actually happen. It would be good to have a system in place for that that isn't just everyone spamming "Wait." If an article is in this staging area for longer than ~3 days, I would either close it or forcibly mark it as a proper nomination (swim or sink). In the end, improving the quality of the encyclopedia is the overarching purpose of every page, and it would be very healthy if we could nurture that on ITN. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 10:35, 23 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think this is a good idea. We already get too many premature nominations, before there's an article or update to assess. Those are a waste of everyone's time. Having a special section of ITN/C dedicated to them might make them easier to ignore, but it would encourage more of them, which isn't a net benefit. It would just become a messy sandbox of incomplete nominations that someone would need to maintain. I would prefer to require an article update before any nomination is made.
What might be more useful is some kind of calendar, which could list known dates of upcoming ITNR items. That only works for scheduled items, but could still be useful. Again it would require careful maintenance by someone; if the dates are incorrect or from the wrong year it becomes useless. Modest Genius talk 11:08, 23 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
The intent is that there should already be a significant article to be able to start getting quality input. If someone adds a nom without an article, that should be closed immediately. Masem (t) 11:38, 23 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
We could do the calendar idea at ITNR, or in a subsection of ITNR. That seems to be a good idea to me. Natg 19 (talk) 17:48, 23 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Added rough "schedule" (the month) for each item at ITNR. Now will have to see how to make/use a calendar. Natg 19 (talk) 22:24, 23 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
@Natg 19: I think for now, adding a few words apiece for sports and awards on the existing ITNR page is a noticeable improvement. It makes the scheduling easier for editors to notice at a glance instead of having to click on several dozens of individual links just to find one or two that may be currently relevant. Nice work. Elections is a different beast since they're not listed individually in the first place and there's presumably hundreds that qualify, so that would almost certainly need to be on a separate page (which can be added as a hatnote to the top of the section) if someone is up for it. Left guide (talk) 22:36, 23 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
On a side note, we have not posted 50% of the sports items on here in the past few years, so the list could be cleaned up. For example, I do not remember seeing a recent nomination for the FIVB Men's Volleyball World Cup, FIS Alpine Ski World Cup, or rugby union Six Nations Championship. Natg 19 (talk) 22:25, 23 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Tentatively support. Maybe we can also leave a note on the talk pages of such articles in the list that the articles may be nomination when the event has passed and it would be good to have the articles up to scratch. – robertsky (talk) 12:20, 23 June 2026 (UTC)[reply]
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