Welcome to Wikinews

A nice cup of coffee for you while you get started

Getting started as a contributor
How to write an article
  1. Pick something current?
  2. Use two independent sources?
  3. Read your sources before writing the story in your own words?. Do choose a unique title? before you start.
  4. Follow Wikinews' structure? for articles, answering as many of who what when where why and how? as you can; summarised in a short, two- or three-sentence opening paragraph. Once complete, your article must be three or more paragraphs.
  5. If you need help, you can add {{helpme}} to your talkpage, along with a question, or alternatively, just ask?

  • Use this tab to enter your title and get a basic article template.
    [RECOMMENDED. Starts your article through the semi-automated {{develop}}—>{{review}}—>{{publish}} collaboration process.]

 Welcome! Thank you for joining Wikinews; we'd love for you to stick around and get more involved. To help you get started we have an essay that will guide you through the process of writing your first full article. There are many other things you can do on the project, but its lifeblood is new, current, stories written neutrally.
As you get more involved, you will need to look into key project policies and other discussions you can participate in; so, keep this message on this page and refer to the other links in it when you want to learn more, or have any problems.

Wikipedia's puzzle-globe logo, © Wikimedia Foundation
Wikipedia's puzzle-globe logo, © Wikimedia Foundation
  Used to contributing to Wikipedia? See here.
All Wikimedia projects have rules. Here are ours.

Listed here are the official policies of the project, you may be referred to some of them if your early attempts at writing articles don't follow them. Don't let this discourage you, we all had to start somewhere.

The rules and guides laid out here are intended to keep content to high standards and meet certain rules the Wikimedia Foundation applies to all projects. It may seem like a lot to read, but you do not have to go through it all in one sitting, or know them all before you can start contributing.

Remember, you should enjoy contributing to the project. If you're really stuck come chat with the regulars. There's usually someone in chat who will be happy to help, but they may not respond instantly.

The core policies
Places to go, people to meet

Wiki projects work because a sense of community forms around the project. Although writing news is far more individualistic than contributing to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, people often need minor help with things like spelling and copyediting. If a story isn't too old you might be able to expand it, or if it is disputed you may be able to find some more sources and rescue it before it is listed for deletion.

There are always discussions going on about how the site could be improved, and your input is of value. Check the links here to see where you can give input to the running of the Wikinews project.

Find help and get involved
Write your first article for Wikinews!

Use the following box to help you create your first article. Simply type in a title to your story and press "Create page". Then start typing text to your story into the new box that will come up. When you're done, press "save page". That's all there is to it!



It is recommended you read the article guide before starting. Also make sure to check the list of recently created articles to see if your story hasn't already been reported upon.


-- Wikinews Welcome (talk) 09:33, 4 August 2013 (UTC)Reply

Hi. I have reviewed TEPCO releases first figures on the extent of Fukushima leakage‎ and left feedback at Talk:TEPCO releases first figures on the extent of Fukushima leakage‎. The video to the left gives a view of this review somewhat so you can see some of what I was looking at, why I made the changes I did and why it was not readied. The current problems are not all together that difficult to fix... but other things like copyright and factual support from the sources have not even been looked at. The article also has problems with passive voice that need fixing and this is not mentioned as much in the review as it could be. In any case, please fix these things as soon as possible and resubmit for review. --LauraHale (talk) 06:32, 6 August 2013 (UTC)Reply

user page edit

I feel a little silly pointing this out here, but didn't want to intrude further on your user page, having already taken the liberty of adding the {{UoW student}} template:  the name of the project is Wikinews rather than WikiNews (i.e., the "n" is lower case). :-)  --Pi zero (talk) 00:09, 7 August 2013 (UTC)Reply

I have reviewed Pakistani President convinces Prime Minister to put all state executions on hold and left feedback at Talk:Pakistani President convinces Prime Minister to put all state executions on hold. The article has problems with source verification. Not all the facts match with the article text. It is difficult to figure out how to remove these facts without losing most of the major text. Please check to make sure all the facts match the text. --LauraHale (talk) 08:22, 19 August 2013 (UTC)Reply

Screencasts of some of today's reviews edit

The six videos are screencasts of reviews done today. As a whole, all the articles have improved tremendously from when they students first submitted. Now, they have infoboxes. They usually have a relevant picture, most of the time giving credit to the photographer. They more often than not have categories. The external links are not in the body. The sources are more consistently and better formatted. These little changes make a huge difference for motivation when reviewing because they show reviewers students are listening to feedback and attempting to get things published according to community standards.

That said, the current issues get to the more difficult spot of issues with making sure inverted pyramid style reporting is done, plagiarism and very close paragraphing need to be better avoided, facts need to match facts conveyed in sources, and relative dating needs to be better done. These are on one level the much harder part of doing good reporting on Wikinews. The screencasts of reviews included from the batch I reviewed this morning are more so you can see that what we are (I am) thinking when we are (I am) reviewing. This may not be educational in terms of teaching you how to report, but it might give you insight into what we are looking for. Hopefully that can be a little bit helpful in terms of understanding what we as a community on Wikinews are looking for in publishable works. --LauraHale (talk) 11:31, 19 August 2013 (UTC)Reply

Spy article edit

I just wanted to say specifically to you that although some of your wording changes were a bit niggly here-and-there, you did well at moving certain sentences toward 'active voice'. It's not common for a college student to be so skilled at doing that. Active voice is a very slippery critter! It gets away from you easily! --Bddpaux (talk) 05:55, 9 November 2013 (UTC)Reply

Typhoon article edit

Don't run away!! You're probably feeling the frustration of the submitting vs. publication strain. It's just a part of journalism. Hang in there!! There is plenty of news taking place right ----at this very moment----- about all the stuff going on in the Philippines.....trust me!! You can even just move some of this article's stuff over to THAT article....so long as the new article is built upon fresh news. See how that works?? --Bddpaux (talk) 18:53, 13 November 2013 (UTC)Reply