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) 00:46, 11 August 2016 (UTC)Reply

Man captured by police after scaling Trump Tower edit

Hi. I did a quick review (we don't always manage to get really prompt feedback, and that can be very frustrating to a newcomer who already has to deal with basically learning everything at once for a first article, so I'm glad I was able to get back to you soon, on this occasion). I didn't find some problems newcomers often have, which was great, but I did find a problem that needs redress. (As a reviewer, you see, I'm not allowed to change too much — if I became a coauthor I'd have to disqualify myself from reviewing it.) Please see my review comments. And welcome to Wikinews; it can be hard to get up our initial learning curve, but most people find once they manage to get an article or two published things get much easier (so we really hope to help folks up that initial curve). --Pi zero (talk) 15:16, 11 August 2016 (UTC)Reply

Alas, I did quite poorly on review today. Did manage to sneak in a re-review of this; see review comments and detailed history of edits during review. Perhaps the edits will be useful going forward, regardless of the fate of the particular article. --Pi zero (talk) 03:26, 13 August 2016 (UTC)Reply
You may have observed, I've reviewed your other article. That one looks to have gone out of date quite rapidly due to additional developments. I really appreciate your edits to other articles, btw; as you may also have observed, just atm we're rather swamped with articles — all in a good cause, the sheer number of articles on the review queue is because of a university journalism class in Australia that, this semester, appears to be meeting on Fridays. Wikinews has a problem — for which I, at least, have in mind a long-term plan to make things work better — when we get a large number of submissions all at once. --Pi zero (talk) 15:18, 13 August 2016 (UTC)Reply

Wikinews Shorts: August 14, 2016 edit

I wasn't sure what to think about length on this, so I did a bunch of other cleanup while considering (see edit history), but finally I just didn't feel right about it. Review comments. --Pi zero (talk) 21:44, 14 August 2016 (UTC)Reply

Share your experience and feedback as a Wikimedian in this global survey edit

Your feedback matters: Final reminder to take the global Wikimedia survey edit

(Sorry to write in Engilsh)

  1. This survey is primarily meant to get feedback on the Wikimedia Foundation's current work, not long-term strategy.
  2. Legal stuff: No purchase necessary. Must be the age of majority to participate. Sponsored by the Wikimedia Foundation located at 149 New Montgomery, San Francisco, CA, USA, 94105. Ends January 31, 2017. Void where prohibited. Click here for contest rules.