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Before making a suggestion, please read the selected anniversaries guidelines. Please remember that this list usually defers to supporting pages when there is disagreement, so it is best to achieve consensus and make any necessary changes there first.
To discuss improvements to the corresponding May 18 article, see Talk:May 18 instead.
Frequently asked questions
Q1: Why is [Insert event here], an event that is "more important and significant" than all the others that are currently listed, not posted?
A1: Relative article quality along with the mix of topics already listed are often deciding factors in what gets posted. Any given day of the year can have a great many important or significant historical events. The problem is that there is generally only room on the Main Page to list about 5 events at a time, so not everything can be posted.
As stated on Wikipedia:FAQ/Main Page, the items and events posted on the Main Page are chosen based more on how well they are written, not based on how much important or significant their subjects are. It is easier for admins to select a well-written, cited, verifiable article over a poor one versus trying to determine objectively how much a subject is important or significant.
Keep in mind that the quality requirements only apply to the selected bolded article, not the other links. Thus, an event may qualify for multiple dates in a year if there is an article written in a summary style and an article providing detailed content; if one of those pages have cleanup issues, the other page can be bolded as an alternate.
Another criterion is to maintain some variety of topics, and not exhibit, just for example, tech-centrism, or the belief that the world stops at the edge of the English-speaking world. Many days have a large pool of potential articles, so they will rotate in and out every year to give each one some Main Page exposure. In addition, an event is not posted if it is also the subject of this year's scheduled featured article or featured picture.
Q2: There are way too many 20th-century events listed. Why aren't there more events from the 19th century and before?
Q3: This page seems to be biased toward events based in [Insert country or region here]. What can be done about it?
A3: This again is attributed to the systemic bias of Wikipedia. Many users are generally more interested in working on good, well-written articles pertaining to their home country. Since this is the English Wikipedia, there will be more English-speaking users, and thus more articles pertaining to English-speaking countries. And if there are more users who are from the United States, there will probably be more well-written articles about events based in the United States. Again, if you would like to further help mitigate the systemic bias in Wikipedia, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Countering systemic bias.
Q4: Why is the birthday/death anniversary of [Insert name here] not listed?
A4: There are only four slots available for birth and death anniversaries. As with the events, article quality and diversity in time period, geography, and reason for notability are all contributing factors in whether an article gets selected for inclusion.
Q5: Are the holidays/observances listed in any particular order?
A5: Yes, there is a specified order: International observances first, then alphabetically by where observed.
Q6: Some of the holidays/observances that are listed have dates in parentheses beside them. What do they mean?
A6: There are two reasons that some holidays/observances have dates next to them:
Non-Gregorian-based holidays/observances are marked with the current year as a reminder to others that their dates do in fact vary from year to year.
National Days, Independence Days, and other holidays celebrating the nationhood of a country are generally marked by the year of the significant historic date being observed.
Today's featured article for May 18, 2024
Tropical Storm Hernan intensifying offshore Mexico on August 26.
Tropical Storm Hernan was a short-lived tropical cyclone that caused widespread flooding and destructive mudslides across southwestern Mexico in late August 2020. The eighth named storm of the 2020 Pacific hurricane season, Hernan formed to the southwest of Mexico on August 26. The cyclone peaked with maximum sustained winds of 75 km/h and a minimum atmospheric pressure of 1001 millibars, before passing just offshore western Mexico and dissipating in the Gulf of California. Hernan, despite not making landfall, dropped extremely heavy rainfall across several states, peaking at nearly 610 millimeters (24 inches) in Jalisco. Over 305 millimeters (12 inches) of rain fell across the Costa Grande of Guerrero from August 24–27. 1,674 homes and 9 schools all suffered severe damage. A man died after falling off his roof checking damages from Hernan. The cyclone caused a total of MXN$594.05 million (USD$26.91 million) in damages across seven states along the Pacific coast of Mexico. (Full article...)
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The note reads
1991 – The Somali National Movement declared the independence of Somaliland (flag pictured), internationally recognised as an autonomous region of Somalia, following the collapse of central government during the Somali Civil War.
Whereas it would be much more neutral to say;
1991 – The Somali National Movement declared the independence of Somaliland (flag pictured), a de factostate that is internationally recognised as an autonomous region of Somalia, following the collapse of central government during the Somali Civil War.
Thank You. Feel free to ask me questions at my talk. Outback the koala (talk) 00:41, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Okay Done. In future, please use WP:ERRORS for things on the main page. Thanks — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 08:45, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
May 18 has been designated as the Day of Remembrance for the Victims of Crimean Tatar Genocide in Ukraine i.e. for the victims of the deportation of the Crimean Tatars. The article is, I believe, in good shape, and we may want to include this per our usual practice, but we should bear in mind that the designation of genocide is reserved to Ukraine only (though when Greek genocide was first posted it was only recognized by Greece, Cyprus and Sweden) and that genocide is currently not the most popular appellation for this event, even though one of the few experts on this does agree with the designation. --GGT (talk) 13:15, 15 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]